ACRO  S  S 
THE  ANDES 

Charles  Johnson  Post 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/acrossandesOOpostrich 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


ACROSS    THE 
ANDES 


BY 

CHARLES  JOHNSON  POST 

A  Tale  of  Wandering  Days  Among  the  Mountains 
of  Bolivia  and  the  Jungles  of  the  Upper  Amazon 


Illustrated  by  the  Author 


NEW    YORK 

OUTING  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 

MCMXII 


F 


"fi 


Copyright,  1912,  by 
OUTING   PUBLISHING   COMPANY 


All  rights  reserved 


Thanks  are  due  to  Harper  and  Brothers  and  to  the  Century 
Company  for  permission  to  incorporate  as  chapters  in  this 
volume,  articles  appearing  in  Harper's  Magazine  and  The  Cen- 
tury, and  to  the  latter  for  the  drawings  and  paintings  accom- 
panying such  articles. 


THE  TROPICS 

'  'rry  ^^  legion  that  never  was  listed," 
I  The  soft-lilting  rhythm  and  song, 

The  starlight,  and  shadowy  tropics, 
The  palms— and  all  that  belong; 
The  unknown  that  ever  persisted 

In  dreams  that  were  epics  of  bliss, 
Of  glory  and  gain  without  effort — > 
And  the  visions  have  faded,  like  this. 

From  dusk  to  dawn,  when  the  heat  is  gone, 
The  home  thoughts  nestle  and  throb, 
And  the  drifting  breeze  through  the  dim, 
gray  trees 
Stirs  up  the  fancies  wan 
Of  the  old,  cool  life  and  a  white  man's  wife 
With  a  w:hite  man^s  babes  on  a  lawn. 
Where  the  soft  greens  please — yet  each  mor- 
row sees 
The  flame  that  follows  the  dawn. 

5 


267434 


6  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

From  dawn  till  eve  the  hot  hours  leave 
Their  mark  like  a  slow-burned  scar; 

And  a  dull,  red  hate  'gainst  the  grilling  fate, 
Impulse  and  fevers  weave; 
While  the  days  to  come — in  years  their  sum — 
The  helpless  thoughts  perceive 
As  an  endless  state,  sans  time  or  date, 
That  only  gods  relieve. 

Rubber  or  gold — the  game  is  old. 
The  lust  and  lure  and  venture; 

And  the  trails  gleam  white  in  the  tropic  night 
Where  the  restless  spirits  mould; 
A  vine-tied  cross  'neath  the  festooned  moss, 
Bones  in  a  matting  rolled; 
No  wrong  or  right,  the  loss  is  slight. 
The  world-old  fooled  of  gold. 

"  The  legion  that  never  was  listed  " — >■ 

The  glamor  of  words  in  a  song, 
The  lure  of  the  strange  and  exotic. 

The  drift  of  the  few  from  the  throng; 
The  past  that  was  never  resisted 

In  the  ebb  or  the  flow  of  desire. 
The  foolish,  the  sordid,  ambitious. 

Now  pay  what  the  gods  require. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  *AG< 

I.  Old   Panama,    Agamemnon,;  and 

The  Genial  Picaroon    •,    r..     .  13 

11.  The  Fighting  Whale,  and  China- 
men IN  THE  Chicken  Coop     .  27 

III.  Through  a  Tropical  Quarantine  46 

IV.  A  Forced  March  Across  the  De- 

sert   OF    Atacama    ....  62 

V.  Arequipa,  the  City  of  Churches  76 

VI.  Through  the  Inca  Country      .  88. 

VII.  Out  of  La  Paz  by  Pack  Train     .  103 

VIII.  The  Back  Trail  Among  the  Ay- 

maras 118 

IX.  Over  the  First  Great  Pass     .     .131 

X.  The  Toll  Gate  and  Mapiri        .  145 

XL  Waiting  for  the  Leccos     .     .     .  159 

XIL  Off  on  the  Long  Drift    .     .     .  172 

XIII.  The  Lecco  Tribe 184 

XIV.  Drifting  Down  the  Rio  Mapiri  200 
XV.  Shooting  the  Ratama      .     .     .  214 

XVI.  Opening  up  the  Jungle  .  .  .  224 
XVII.  Twenty-Three  Days  Against  the 

Current 238 

XVIII.  By    Pack    Mule    Through    the 

Jungle       ,      ,      ,     ,     ,     .     .  252 


8  CONTENTS^ 

CHAPTER  PAGB 

XIX.  The  Indian  Uprising    ....  266. 

XX.  Ambushed  by  Ladrones     .     .      .  280 

XXI.  The  Music  of  the  AymarAs     .      .  289 

XXII.  Back  Home .  299 

XXIII.  Off  Across  the  Continent  in  a 

Batalon 309 

XXIV.  Through  the   Rubber  Country  321 
XXV.  A    New     Crew    and    Another 

Batalon 337 

XXyi.  The  Falls  of  the  Madeira  and 

Home 350 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Running  the  Rapids  of  the  Ratama Frontispiece 

PAG« 

Announced  that  a  person,  a  somebody,  was  awaiting  me 

below 13 

Pointed  scornfully  to  the  outside 15 

Agamemnon 18 

Those  who  refused  to  pay  were  thrown  into  the  chicken 

coop 35 

When  the  end  lid  was  taken  off  the  bodies  of  eight  dead 

Chinamen   were   taken   out ^y 

A  deserted  brigantine  at  anchor  dipped  slowly  with  the  long 

Pacific  swells     .  _ 42 

What  the  diplomat  said  was  direct  and  voluble  ....  49 
A  wide  dusty  canal  which  in  the  intervals  between  showers 

serves  as  a  market (facing  page)  50 

Close  resemblance  to  an  army  of  drunken  bugs  ....  52 
Every   day  our  winches   whirred   and   clattered   off   some 

dusty,  sand-blown  port (facing  page)  54 

lyima,   a   delightful   city  of   contrasts 58 

An    Arequipa    carrier 78 

In  Arequipa,  the  city  of  churches     .      .     .     (facing  page)  80 

Hardly  a  day  without  its   Saint's  fiesta 83 

An   Andean   touring   car 85 

In  Pizarro's  day  it  was  probably  the  same — costume,  craft, 

and  barter (facing  page)  100 

Haggled  with  arrieros  over  pack  mules 104 

Prisoners  along  the  trail  up  from  La  Paz   (facing  page)  106 

Aymara    driver  of  pack  llamas iii 

Members  of  a  gang  of  prisoners 112 

The  guard   for  the  road  menders 114 

Rodriguez   and   his    Cholo   helpers   tightened   the   rawhide 

cinches    and    replaced    the   packs 116 

Aymara  herders  played  their  weird  flutes 123 

A  few  streets  were  still  plainly  marked,  though  the  village 

has  been  dead  these  many  centuries     .     (facing  page)  128 


10  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PACK 

Blizzards  blowing  from  the  Andean  passes 133 

Soldering  the  food  in  tin  cans 138 

Scattered  in  hysterical  flight  up  and  down  the  precipitous 

^  slope 141 

Skirted  the  base  of  an  unbroken  cliff 142 

Toll  gate  in  Mapiri        145 

An  Andean  mountaineer 146 

There  loomed  the  big  mound  of  stones  with  a  twig  cross  on 

top {facing  page)  148 

Slowly  the  rafts  sank  under  the  weight 172 

The  shrewish,  leather-skinned  Indian  wife 174 

There  were,   according  to  the  Lecco   standards,  no  "bad 

places"  yet 179 

Leccos  lowering  the  callapo  through  shallows     ....  181 

Lecco   of   the    twig    raft 182 

These  Leccos  are  among  the  finest  Indians 184 

Napoleon,  a  Lecco  chief 188 

A    Lecco    type 189 

We  seemed  to  move  with  intolerable  slowness     ....  203 

But  it  is  those  parts  of  the  river  that  the  Leccos  fairly  love  209 

A    rubber    picker 2iti 

On  a  rope  a  trolley  worked  back  and  forth  from  which  was 

suspended  a  tiny  platform     .........  258 

Never  was  there  such  a  ride — not  even  in  the  Rapids  of  the 

Ratama {facing  page)  264 

The  Tacana  brides,   adjusted   for  themselves   comfortable 

niches    in   the    cargo 314 

At  the  tiller  presided  a  huge  Tacana  ^ 316 

Never  was  such  an  exhibition  in  the  history  of  firearms     .  319 
But  it  was  monkey  that  furnished  them  with  the  greatest 

delicacy 323 

Often  we  pass  a  little  shelter  of  palm  leaves     ....  326 

Night  camp  on  the  Rio  Beni  on  the  way  out  {facing  page)  328 

It  was  only  the  shack  of  a  lonely  rubber  picker     ....  330 

In  the  thin  blue  smoke,  it  at  once  turned  a  pale  yellow     .  332 
Justice  is  administered  according  to  the  standards  of  his 

submissive  domain         333 

The  bolachas  of  rubber  are  threaded  on  long  ropes     .     .  348 

Dragging  a  batalon  around  the  portage  of  the  Madeira  Falls  351 


i 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

CHAPTER  I 

OLD   PANAMA^   AGAMEMNON,   AND  THE  GENIAL 
PICAROON 


IT  was  in  Panama — the  old  Panama — and  in 
front  of  the  faded  and  blistered  hotel  that  I 
met  him  again.     A  bare-footed,  soft-voiced 
mozo  had  announced  that  a  person,  a  somebody, 
was  awaiting  me  below.     Down  in  the  broken- 


ANNOUNC^D    THAT    A    PERSON,    A    SOMEBODY,    WAS    AWAITING    ME 
BEI,0W. 

13 


14  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

tiled  lobby  a  soured,  saffron  clerk  pointed  scorn- 
fully to  the  outside.  Silhouetted  against  the  hot 
shimmer  that  boiled  up  from  the  street  was  a 
jaunty  figure  in  a  native,  flapping  muslin  jacket, 
native  rope-soled  shoes,  and  dungaree  breeches, 
carefully  rolling  a  cigarette  from  a  little  bag  of 
army  Durham.  It  turned  and,  from  beneath 
the  frayed  brim  of  a  native  hat,  there  beamed 
upon  me  the  genial  assurance  of  Bert,  one  time 
of  the  Fifth  Army  Corps,  Santiago  de  Cuba, 
and  occasionally  of  New  York;  and  within  my 
heart  I  rejoiced.  Without,  I  made  a  signal  that 
secured  a  bottle  of  green,  bilious,  luke-warm 
native  beer  and  settled  myself  placidly  for  en- 
tertainment. 

A  panicky  quarantine  stretched  up  and  down 
some  few  thousand  miles  of  the  West  Coast  that 
left  the  steamer  schedules  a  straggling  chaos. 
For  fifteen  dull,  broiling  days  I  had  swapped 
hopes  and  rumors  with  the  polyglot  steamship 
clerk  or  hung  idly  over  the  balcony  of  the  Hotel 
Marina  watching  the  buzzards  hopping  about 
the  mud  flats  or  grouped  hopefully  under  the 
quarter  of  a  slimy  smack.  Once  I  had  inspected 
the  Colombian  navy  that  happened  to  be  lying 
off  the  Boca  and  observed  a  bran-new  pair  of 


15 


OLD  PANAMA 

white   flannels   go  to   their; 
ruin  as   a   drunken   ScotcH 
enginee  r 
teetered 
d  own  an 
iron    lad- 
der with  a  lidless  coal-oil 
lamp   waving   in    discur- 
sive gestures;  once  I  had 
met  a  mild,  dull,  person 
who    had    just    come    up 
Magdalena    River    way 
with  a  chunk  of  gold  that 
he    assured    me — without 
detail — had   been  hacked 
off  by  a  machete,  but  here  ^^^  °^''^'^- 
his   feeble    imagination   flickered   out   and   he 
wrapped  the  rest  in  a  poorly  wrought  mystery 
until  finally  he  fluttered  over  to  Colon  for  the 
next  steamer  of  innocent  possibilities. 

With  these  the  respectable  amusements  were 
exhausted  and  I  therefore  rejoiced  as  I  con- 
fronted that  cheerful,  raconteuring  adventurer 
under  the  battered  Panama.    A  ship's  purser,  a 


POINTED       SCORNFUI,I,Y     TO 


fi6  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

drummer  of  smoked  hams,  a  Coney  Island 
barker,  a  soldier,  a  drifter,  and  always  a  teller 
of  tales,  he  had  lain  in  the  trenches  on  Misery 
Hill  before  Santiago  in  support  of  Capron's 
Battery  with  a  gaunt  group  around  him  as  he 
wove  the  drifting  thread  of  adventure  from  the 
Bowery  to  the  Barbary  Coast  in  a  series  of  ro- 
bust anecdotes.  And  they  bore  the  earmarks  of 
truth. 

Now,  in  the  genial  silhouette  framed  against 
the  tropic  glare,  I  realized  that  whatever  days 
of  waiting  might  be  in  store  they  would  no 
longer  be  dull.  A  true  rumor  had  put  him  in 
a  lone  commercial  venture  somewhere  down 
these  coasts  and  here  at  my  elbow  was  to  be 
placed  all  the  shift  and  coil  of  petty  adventure, 
whimsical  romance,  and  the  ultimate  results  of 
two  years  of  adroit  piracy  in  and  out  of  the 
Spanish  Main  that  had  ended,  as  I  observed,  in 
dungaree  breeches,  rope-soled  alpargatas,  and  a 
battered  Panama  hat. 

Therefore  through  the  ministrations  of  an  oc- 
casional bottle  of  the  native  bilious  beer  and 
other  transactions  that  shall  remain  private,  the 
days  sped  themselves  swiftly  and  unheeded 
guided  by  the  adept  hand  of  Romance.     Again, 


OLD  PANAMA  17 

as  in  the  trenches,  I  viewed  the  world  under  As- 
modean  influences,  but  what  I  heard  has  no 
place  in  these  pages ;  it  is  worth  an  endeavor  all 
its  own.  Then,  one  morning,  the  news  spread 
that  at  last  the  Mapocho  lay  at  the  Boca  and  the 
hour  of  departure  for  the  first  stage  to  the  in- 
terior of  South  America  was  at  hand ;  the  night 
before  was  the  last  I  saw  of  my  genial  friend. 
In  the  morning  he  did  not  appear,  and  it  was 
strange,  for  I  had  expected  to  do  the  proper 
thing,  as  I  saw  it,  realizing  that  dungarees  and 
alpargatas  are  poor  armor  and  that  our  con- 
sulates offer  but  a  desperate  and  prickly  hospi- 
tality. 

In  the  afternoon  I  went  aboard,  crawling 
down  a  gangway  that  dropped  to  the  deck  like 
a  ladder  where,  in  the  morning,  it  had  reared 
itself  with  equal  steepness  against  the  Mapocho' s 
sides.  Such  are  the  Pacific  tides  at  the  Boca. 
Agamemnon,  the  shriveled  little  Barbadoes 
darky,  scuttled  about  importantly,  stowing  our 
baggage  and  giving  an  occasional  haughty  or- 
der to  some  steward  in  a  nondescript  patois  that 
passed  mainly  as  Spanish  and  that  often  served, 
as  I  learned,  better  than  the  purest  Ollendorfian 
Castilian.     Later  it  appeared  that  Agamemnon 


i8 


ACROSS   THE  ANDES 


had  left  one  of  these  same 
steamers  under  a  cloud — 
a  trifling  matter  of  a  few 
sheets  and  pillow  cases — 
and  now  to  return  clothed 
with  trust  and  authority 
over  "  de  fixin's  an  de 
baggage  of  gent'mens " 
swelled  him  with  an  in- 
articulate triumph. 

In  the  long  months 
that  followed  none  could 
have  given  more  faithful 
service  or  loyalty  than 
this  skimpy  Barbadoes 
darky.  That  is  within 
his  limitations,  for  he 
could  no  more  resist 
liquor  than  a  bear  can 
honey,  but  nevertheless 
when  he  had  transgress- 
ed, his  uncertain  legs 
would  bring  him  back  to 
his  duties,  speechless  per- 
haps, but  with  arms  wavering  in  gestures  of  ex- 
tenuation. 


AGAMEMNON 


OLD  PANAMA  19 

Also  to  Agamemnon  wages  meant  nothing; 
a  shilling  now  and  again — sometimes  even  the 
equivalent  of  a  whole  dollar — advanced  him 
with  the  specific  understanding  that  it  was  for 
gambling  and  not  for  liquor.  Once,  in  La  Paz, 
he  won  a  hundred  and  fifty  dollars,  Mex,  and  be- 
came an  impossible  animal  until  it  had  been 
frittered  away.  In  the  same  city  he  went  to  the 
bull  fight  and  joined  in  the  play  against  the  final 
bull  that  is  "  dedicated  to  the  people  "  and  fought 
so  cleverly  that  we  became  prominent  by  reflec- 
tion and  gave  a  party  at  the  corrida  the  follow- 
ing Sunday  to  see  Agamemnon's  promised  per- 
formance. 

By  this  time  Agamemnon  had  become  a  cha- 
racter and  a  score  of  little  boys  scrambled  over 
the  barrier  eager  to  hold  his  hat,  his  coat,  and 
his  cuffs.  With  a  flourish  he  handed  each  to  its 
eager  guardian  and  then,  with  a  coat  held  as  a 
capa,  gave  a  flourish  and  advanced  toward  the 
bull.  The  crowd  applauded.  Agamemnon 
made  a  bow  and  a  flourish  and  waggled  the  coat. 
The  bull  snuffed  briskly  and  charged.  Alasl 
The  hand  had  lost  its  cunning,  for  Agamemnon 
shot  ten  feet  skyward,  turned  an  involuntary  som- 
ersault  at   the    apex   of   his   flight,   and    then 


20  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

sprawled  back  to  earth.  A  half  dozen  of  the 
toreros  drew  off  the  bull;  the  small  boy  custo- 
dians flung  his  garments  at  him  scornfully, while 
the  Bolivian  audience  laughed  itself  hoarse  as 
the  dusty,  dishevelled  figure  hobbled  out  of  the 
ring  and  away  from  the  crowd. 

For  himself  Agamemnon  asked  but  little  al- 
though where  he  felt  that  the  dignity  of  his  posi- 
tion was  involved  he  became  a  tower  of  strength. 
It  was  in  the  same  city  that  he  felt  the  hotel  peo- 
ple were  not  treating  him  fairly,  as  they  were 
not,  and  his  remonstrance  was  met  by  a  Cholo 
mozo  who  hurled  a  sugar  bowl  at  his  head  and 
followed  it  up  with  a  knife.  Agamemnon 
dodged  and  beat  down  the  Indian  with  a  chair; 
on  the  instant  a  half  dozen  Cholos  poured  at 
him  and  the  kitchen  was  in  a  riot.  Backing 
away,  he  denuded  the  dining  tables  of  service 
and  used  it  as  a  light  artillery  fire.  By  the  aid 
of  an  earthenware  jar,  some  handy  crockery,  and 
a  chair  he  was  able  to  retreat  safely  across  the 
patio  and  up  the  stairway  that  led  to  our  rooms. 
A  water  pitcher  laid  open  a  skull  and  a  wash- 
bowl stopped  the  rush  long  enough  for  him  to 
grab  a  gun  from  the  pillow  when  we  arrived, 
together  with  some  stubby  Bolivian  police  and 


OLD  PANAMA  21 

the  bony  Russian  proprietor;  order  was  restored, 
fortunately,  for  it  might  have  been  serious. 

Agamemnon  explained  satisfactorily  and  in- 
cidentally showed  only  a  minor  bump  or  so,  but 
his  Cholo  and  Aymara  antagonists  bore  most 
proper  marks  of  the  conflict.  That  night  in  the 
midst  of  his  shoe-polishing  and  packing  he  re- 
marked briefly:  "If  you  gent'mens  hadn't  er- 
come  jes'  den  I  cer'nly  would  have  licked  dem 
fellers,  bahs!"  Apparently  no  victory  was 
complete  to  his  mind  until  he  had  accomplished 
a  massacre. 

At  another  time  he  waded  into  a  crowd  of 
Cholos  in  the  interior  and  took  from  them  their 
machetes  and  shot-guns,  acting  on  his  own  in- 
itiative, because  he  knew  that  in  that  far  interior 
laborers  were  too  precious  to  waste  by  their  own 
fighting.  From  our  tent  we  heard  two  shots 
and  the  rising  yells  of  a  small  riot  and  then,  be- 
fore there  was  time  to  grab  a  gun  or  gather  the 
few  white  men,  the  figure  of  Agamemnon  stag- 
gered up  the  crest  of  the  river  bank  with  his 
arms  full  of  the  commandeered  machetes  and 
trade-guns. 

There  was  the  time  when  a  balsa  upset  in  a 
boiling  eddy  and  Agamemnon  jumped  in  as  a 


22  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

faithful  rescuer  only  to  still  further  compli- 
cate matters ;  also  when — but  it  is  useless,  Aga- 
memnon is  a  story  in  himself.  Tireless,  uncom- 
plaining, honest,  loyal,  yet  of  the  aimless  tribe  of 
bandar-log,  apparently  only  merely  the  mouse 
of  a  man  in  a  wrinkled  black  skin  and  yet  the 
paragon  of  retainers.  Peace  be  to  him  wher- 
ever he  has  drifted. 

At  the  table  that  evening  on  the  Mapocho  the 
few  passengers  looked  each  other  over  in  the 
customary,  stand-offish  way, — a  couple  of  fresh 
faced  young  Englishmen  adventuring  to  clerk- 
ships, a  German  commercial  traveler — an  expert 
in  those  Latin  countries  who  makes  one  blush 
for  the  self-complacent,  brusque,  greaser-hating 
jingoes  that  are  only  too  typical  of  our  export  ef- 
forts— three  mining  engineers,  a  returning  Peru- 
vian diplomat  for  whose  presence  we  later 
blessed  him  and  a  couple  of  native  Ecuadorean 
families,  wealthy  cacao  haciendados,  who 
flocked  by  themselves  in  a  slatternly,  noisy 
group. 

But  by  the  next  evening,  drawn  together  by 
the  prospect  of  a  tedious,  uncertain  voyage 
through  erratic  quarantines,  we  were  one  large 
family.     We  lay  back  in  our  canvas  chairs  un- 


OLD  PANAMA  23 

der  the  galvanized  iron  roof  of  the  upper  deck 
— so  generally  peaceful  are  those  seas  that  the 
awning  is  permanent— and  watched  the  South- 
ern Cross  flickering  dimly  above  the  southern 
horizon.  The  cigars  glowed  in  silence  for, 
though  it  was  the  hour  for  yarning,  each  bash- 
fully hung  back.  Then  an  engineer  started. 
The  Philippines,  Alaska,  the  boom  camps, 
Mexico  rose  in  successive  backgrounds  and  then 
the  talk  shifted  round  to  our  respective  objec- 
tives down  this  long  coast.  One  was  for  the 
nitrate  fields,  one  for  the  Peruvian  silver  mines, 
and  one  for  the  rich  placer  banks  of  the  far  in- 
terior. The  one  who  was  bound  for  an  exami- 
nation of  Peruvian  silver  mines — a  mountain  of 
a  man — finally  made  a  confidence: 

"  Gold,"  he  remarked  as  an  obvious  prelim- 
inary, "  gold —  or  silver,  I'm  a  Bryan  man — is 
generally  good  enough  for  anyone,  but  if  I  had 
my  choice  I  don't  mind  saying  that  I'd  rather 
have  a  coal  mine  down  here  in  South  America 
than  either  or  anything!  " 

The  others  sighed  enviously.  A  coal  mine  in 
South  America  where  there  is  no  coal  except 
that  from  Australia  and  Wales  and  where 
a  couple  of  hundred  miles  from  the  coast  it  is 


24  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

worth  twenty  dollars,  gold,  a  ton!  A  coal  mine 
— well — it  is  the  stuff  of  which  dreams  are  made 
in  South  America. 

"  Yessir,"  he  went  on  raptly,  "  coal  is  the 
thing.  And  I  don't  mind  admitting  that  I've 
got  it." 

He  hauled  a  black  object  from  his  pocket 
and  held  it  out.  Eagerly  it  was  snatched  from 
his  hand.  There  it  was,  hard,  shiny,  black, 
varying  in  no  way  from  those  in  the  kitchen 
scuttle  at  home — a  splendid  sample  of  anthra- 
cite coal!     It  was  too  good.     They  laughed. 

"Bring  it  from  home?"  they  asked  pleas- 
antly. 

The  mountainous  engineer  chuckled  con- 
tentedly. "  That's  anthracite  and  as  fine  a  speci- 
men as  I  ever  saw.  I  don't  mind  talking  a  little 
freely  since  I've  got  it  covered  in  an  iron-clad 
contract.' 

"  You  see,"  he  went  on  good-naturedly,  "  I'm 
always  wide  awake  and  the  morning  we  left  the 
Boca  a  young  chap  came  aboard — American, 
too,  and  right  pleasant  spoken — where  I  was 
sort  of  loafing  and  we  got  acquainted.  To  make 
a  long  story  short,  he'd  been  wandering  around 
up  in  the  back  country  of  Colombia  and  had 


OLD  PANAMA  25 

located  this  coal.  He  didn't  have  any  special 
idea  of  what  coal  meant  down  these  ways — he 
was  from  Pennsylvania,  son  of  a  pit  boss  or 
something  and  coal  was  as  common  to  him  as 
water  to  a  duck — but  when  he  pulled  out  a 
couple  of  these  samples  you  bet  I  froze  fast. 
He  tried  to  be  mighty  quiet  and  mysterious 
when  he  saw  I  was  interested — you  know  how 
such  a  chap  is  when  he  thinks  he's  got  a  good 
thing,  and  he  was  sort  of  on  the  beach,  down 
on  his  luck  you  know — but  I  pumped  him  all 
right. 

"  He  had  a  fool  idea  of  going  home  as  best  he 
could  and  then  taking  the  family  sock  and  comr 
bining  it  with  other  family  socks  and  coming 
back  and  opening  up  his  coal  mine."  The  big 
engineer  chuckled  again.  "Why  there's  a 
king's  fortune  in  that  mine,  so  your  Uncle  Jim 
stepped  right  in  and  tied  him  up  close.  I  cabled 
my  principals  and  I'll  get  a  cable  when  we  reach 
Callao.  This  coal  makes  their  silver  look  like 
thirty  cents.  Of  course,  I  wasn't  going  to  take 
any  chances  at  this  stage — it  might  be  phony — 
but  that  fellow  is  on  the  level.  Said  he  wouldn't 
take  any  money  down — not  that  I'd  have  given 
it  by  a  long  shot — but  after  I  got  back  he'd  join 


26  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

me  and  come  back  into  Colombia.  He  gave  me 
a  map  of  the  location  in  case  of  accident." 

"  Gave  him  no  money — poor  fellow,  art  for 
art's  sake?  "  asked  one. 

"  Well,  yes,"  the  big  man  nodded  good- 
humoredly,  "  thirty  dollars — enough  to  take 
him  back  to  the  States  steerage — I  felt  almost 
ashamed.  Said  he  didn't  need  any  more  to  get 
home  with — that  sounded  on  the  level,  didn't  it? 
He'd  had  a  tough  time  all  right — fever,  grub 
and  etcetery  back  in  the  country — and  was  down 
to  dungaree  breeches,  rope-soled  shoes,  and  one 
of  these  slimpsey  native  calico  jackets." 

"  And  he  could  roll  a  cigarette  with  one  hand 
better  than  most  can  with  two?  "  I  asked. 

The  big  engineer  paused  for  an  instant's 
thought  and  then  suddenly  sat  up.  No  wonder 
my  friend  of  the  Fifth  Army  Corps  and  the 
dungaree  breeches,  alpargatas,  and  battered 
Panama  and  muslin  jacket  had  suddenly  disap- 
peared. Thirty  large,  golden  dollars  of  real 
money,  good  at  par  in  the  States  or  for  three 
pecks  of  local  paper  collateral  anywhere  on  the 
Mosquito  Coast!  And  all  that  for  one  paltry 
little  yarn. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  FIGHTING  WHALE  AND  CHINAMEN  IN  THE 
CHICKEN  COOB 

THE  hot  days  drifted  by  in  easy  sociability, 
dividing  themselves  into  a  pliant  routine. 
The  morning  was  devoted  to  golf  on  the 
canvas  covered  deck  over  a  nine-hole  course 
chalked  around  ventilators,  chicken-coops  and 
deck-houses.  Crook-handled  canes  furnished 
the  clubs  and  three  sets  of  checkers  were  lost 
overboard  before  we  reached  the  Guayas  River, 
the  little  round  men  skidding  flatly  over  the 
deck  with  a  pleasing  accuracy  only  at  the  end 
to  rise  up  maliciously  on  one  ear  and  roll,  plop, 
into  the  sea.  In  the  white-hot  afternoon,  when 
the  scant  breeze  would  quite  as  likely  drift  with 
us,  the  hours  were  sacred  to  the  siesta,  and  the 
evenings  were  devoted  to  standardizing  an  in- 
ternational, polyglot  poker. 

A  rope  stretched  across  the  after-deck  marked 

27 


28  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

off  the  steerage.  There  was  no  second  class 
as  a  thrifty  French  tailor,  a  fine  young  man,  and 
his  soft-voiced  Mediterranean  bride  found  out. 
They  had  bought  second  class  through  to  Lima 
and  at  the  Boca  were  flung  in  aft  among  the 
half-breeds,  a  squabbling  lot  of  steerage  scum, 
together  with  a  gang  of  Chinamen.  A  line  of 
piled  baggage  ran  lengthwise,  on  one  side  of 
which  were  supposed  to  be  the  bachelors'  quar- 
ters, though  somewhere  between  decks  were 
hutches  where,  if  one  really  insisted  on  privacy, 
the  tropical  night  could  be  passed  in  a  fetid 
broil. 

Through  a  surreptitious  connivance  this 
couple  were  allowed  quarters  forward  and  even- 
ing after  evening  the  little  bride  would  bring 
her  guitar  out  and  play — and  such  playing! 
She  had  been  on  the  stage,  it  seemed,  and  from 
opera  to  opera  she  drifted  and  then  off  into  odd, 
unheard  folk  songs,  or  the  vibrant  German  or 
Russian  songs.  Never  before  or  since  have  I 
heard  such  playing  of  a  guitar  or  felt  its  pos- 
sibilities. For  us  the  guitar  is  an  instrument 
lazily  plunked  by  the  end  man  against  two 
mandolins.  Yet  there  was  a  time  when  Paga- 
nini  deemed  it  worthy  of  mastery. 


THE   FIGHTING   WHALE         29 

She  was  playing  late  one  afternoon  and  we 
were  all  gathered  around  in  the  dining  hall. 
There  came  a  rush  of  feet  overhead  and  a  shrill, 
excited  chattering.  We  broke  for  the  deck,  ex- 
pecting a  mutiny  among  the  Chinamen  at  the 
very  least,  and  there  in  full  view,  not  five  hun- 
dred yards  away,  was  a  battle  between  a  whale 
and  three  thrasher  sharks.  In  a  great  circle  the 
sea  was  churned  to  a  foam,  boiling  with  the 
stroke  of  fin  and  fluke  as  the  sharks  outflanked 
and  harried  the  whale. 

In  a  steady  succession  the  sharks  would  shoot 
high  out  of  the  water  in  a  graceful,  deadly  curve 
and,  as  they  fell  back,  suddenly  stiffen  in  a  whip- 
lash bend  that  instantly  straightened  at  the  mo- 
ment of  impact,  sending  a  flying  mass  of  spray 
like  that  when  a  solid  shot  ricochets  in  gun  prac- 
tice. A  few  such  blows  and  even  a  bulky,  blub- 
ber-coated whale  would  feel  it.  Sometimes  a 
shark  would  strike  fair,  though  more  often  he 
would  waste  his  energy  on  the  empty  water  as 
the  whale  dove. 

But  the  steadiness  of  the  battering  attack, 
sometimes  all  three  sharks  in  the  air  as  though 
by  a  signal,  sometimes  a  steady  procession  pour- 
ing up  from  the  sea  in  a  wicked  arc  as  regular 


30  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

as  a  clock's  ticking,  and  sometimes  the  frantic 
whirling  of  the  whale  showed  the  submarine 
strategists  at  work,  while  only  a  single  shark  shot 
up  in  a  well-aimed,  whip-lash  stroke.  In  des- 
peration the  whale  would  stand  on  its  head  and 
beat  the  air  in  terrific  blows  with  its  flukes  while 
the  sharks  would  merely  wait  till  the  flurry  was 
over  and  then  renew  their  steady,  wearing, 
pounding  battle. 

Off  at  one  side  of  the  circle  of  beaten  foam 
was  a  little  dark  patch  that  paddled  nervously 
about  and  that  we  had  overlooked — a  whale- 
calf.  And  now  it  was  apparent  why  the  fight 
was  fought  in  the  diameter  of  a  ship's  length; 
always  the  bulk  of  the  grim  old  mother  was  be- 
tween the  attack  and  her  clumsy  baby;  there 
was  the  reason  why  she  did  not  make  a  running 
fight  of  it  that  would  have  given  her  a  more  even 
break — for  the  speed  of  a  squadron  is  that  of  its 
slowest  ship.  All  the  advantage  lay  with  the 
sharks ;  it  was  easy  to  see  they  were  wearing  the 
whale  down.  Less  often  she  stood  on  her  head 
to  batter  the  foam  hopefully  with  her  ponderous 
flukes;  the  sharks  redoubled  their  efforts  until 
they  curved  in  a  steady,  leaping  line. 

Along  the  rail  of  the  Mapocho  the  passengers, 


THE  FIGHTING   WHALE        31 

deck  and  cabin,  cheered  the  battle  as  their  tense 
sympathies  dictated  or  drew  whistling  breaths 
as  some  crashing  whip-lash  went  home.  The 
deep  sapphire  of  the  sea  rippling  under  the  brisk 
evening  breeze,  the  turquoise  heaven  that  swept 
down  to  the  horizon  softly  shifting  against  the 
sapphire  contrast  to  a  mystery  of  fragile  green, 
the  field  of  battle  boiling  and  eddying  in  the 
mellow  orange  glow  of  the  long  rays  of  the  set- 
ting sun  and  bursting  into  masses  of  iridescent 
spray  made  a  noble  setting  worthy  of  the  cause, 
and  in  it  eighty  tons  of  mother-love  and  devotion 
measuring  itself  in  horse-power  and  foot-tons 
was  slowly  drooping  under  the  hail  from  a  slim, 
glittering,  iridescent  arc. 

Smaller  grew  the  fight  in  the  distance — a  mile 
> — a  mile  and  a  half — then  two-thirds  of  the 
whale's  bulk  shot  clear  of  the  surface  and  she 
fell  back  heavily.  Once  more  the  head  went 
down  and  the  flukes  raised  themselves,  lashing 
the  air  in  frantic  desperation.  The  curving, 
confident  line  of  sharks  shot  upward  in  a  grace- 
ful curve,  but  this  time,  overconfident,  they  had 
miscalculated.  The  great  tail  caught  one  shark 
and  he  hurtled  through  the  flying  spray  with  a 
broken  back;  the  flukes  crashed  down  on  a  sec- 


32  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

ond  as  he  struck  the  water.  Once  only  the  sur- 
viving shark  leaped  and  missed.  Alone  he 
could  do  no  more ;  the  whale  in  one  lucky  stroke 
had  won.  Through  the  glasses  we  could  make 
out  its  low  mass  slowly  swimming  off,  every  now 
and  then  spouting  a  feather  of  spray  from  her 
blow-hole  as  though  saluting  her  own  victorious 
progress  with  a  steam-whistle. 

Five  days  out  from  Panama  and  we  awoke  to 
find  the  Mapocho  swinging  to  her  anchor  in  the 
Guayas  River  and  awaiting  the  pleasure  of  the 
port-doctor.  On  one  side  a  distant  shore  loomed 
through  the  heated,  humid  haze,  on  the  other  a 
sluggish  tide-water  creek  disappeared  in  the 
jungle  of  the  bank  an  easy  rifle-shot  away.  A 
ramshackle  church  with  a  huge  crucifix  showed 
at  one  side  of  the  port-doctor's  house  and  here 
and  there  a  few  houses  and  thatched  roofs  ap- 
peared above  a  stretch  of  white  beach.  A  few 
black  pigs  wandered  about,  showing  the  only 
signs  of  life.  Somewhere  beyond  this  dismal 
outpost  was  Guayaquil.  Already  in  the  cap- 
tain's quarters  was  a  conference  of  the  skipper, 
the  young  Chilean  ship's  doctor  fresh  from 
school  and  on  his  first  trip,  and  the  port  doctor. 

Prensently  they  emerged,  the  captain  feebly 


THE  FIGHTING   WHALE        33 

expostulating.  We  were  to  be  held  "  under  ob- 
servation "  for  forty-eight  hours  as  yellow  fever 
and  bubonic  suspects.  That  Guayaquil  should 
quarantine  against  anything  is — at  the  least  to  an 
ordinary  sense  of  humor — funny,  for  Guayaquil 
has  never  seen  the  time  that  it  was  likely  to  catch 
anything  it  did  not  already  have,  except  a  clean 
bill  of  health. 

We  learned  for  the  first  time  that  there  were 
three  Chileans  abroad  who  were  being  returned 
to  Chile  by  their  consul.  They  were  anemic, 
destitute  and  sick  with  malarial  fever;  although 
the  whole  coast  was  in  a  panic  over  yellow  fever 
and  the  bubonic,  yet  this  time  had  been  chosen 
to  ship  them  home  some  two  thousand  miles  to  a 
Chilean  hospital!  They  had  been  stowed  be- 
tween decks  and  the  young  ship's  doctor  had 
made  the  mistake  of  attempting  to  gloss  over 
their  existence,  or  at  any  rate  to  split  the  dif- 
ference between  truth  and  expediency,  and  had 
succeeded  only  in  exciting  a  peevish  suspicion  in 
a  marooned  gentleman  who  had  some  power. 
He  did  not  even  look  at  the  cases — quarantine 
forty-eight  hours,  and  then  he  would  return  with 
advices  from  the  government. 

A  few  of  us  went  down  to  take  a  look  at  the 


34  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

Chilenos  whose  appearance  had  held  us  up. 
There  was  no  formal  hospital  on  board  so  a  little 
compartment  had  been  hastily  thrown  up  be- 
tween decks.  It  was  built  of  the  loose  planks 
on  which  the  cattle  stand  during  the  voyage;  it 
was  closed  on  all  four  sides,  windowless,  and 
with  but  a  single  opening  for  a  doorway  cur- 
tained by  a  filthy  piece  of  canvas.  This  black 
hole,  reeking  with  filth,  was  the  hospital;  a 
couple  of  figures  lay  on  the  floor  and  looked  up 
dully  at  the  sudden  flare  of  a  match  while,  from 
an  open  cargo  port,  the  third  was  tottering,  a 
shrunken  wreck  with  the  ghastly  teeth  of  a  skull 
and  socketed  eyes. 

At  noon  the  purser  presented  each  first  cabin 
passenger  with  a  little  bill  for  half  a  sovereign — 
two  dollars  and  a  half,  gold — which  amount  we 
were  charged  for  as  demurrage  every  day  in  any 
quarantine.  The  deck  steerage  paid  a  shilling, 
gold,  each  day. 

The  purser,  a  pleasant  young  Chilean  with  an 
Irish  name,  yet  who  spoke  no  word  of  English, 
was  the  one  busy  man  on  the  idle  ship.  In  ex- 
pectation of  quarantine  the  occupants  of  the  port 
chicken  coop  had  been  transferred  and  now  the 
purser  appeared  with  the  first  officer,  the  boat- 


THE  FIGHTING   WHALE 


35 


swain,  and  a  few  of  the  crew.  They  climbed 
the  rope  and  the  purser  jangled  a  chain  and  pad- 
lock suggestively.  One  by  one  the  shillings 
came  out.  He  reached  the  Chinamen;  some 
were  dragged  from  below  or  hauled  out  from 
the  partition  of  baggage  in  which  they  had  tried 
to  hide,  all  protesting  sullenly.  Those  who  re- 
fused to  pay  were  thrown  into  the  chicken  coop 


THOSe   WHO  REFUSED  TO   PAY  WERE  THROWN   INTO  THE  CHICKEN 


COOP. 


until  about  a  dozen  were  jammed  into  its  close 
quarters.  It  was  too  low  for  even  a  small  man 
to  stand  upright,  while  its  condition  made  it  im- 
possible to  lie  down  so  that  the  Chinamen  squat- 
ted on  the  floor  or  huddled  up  on  the  perches. 


36  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Then  as  they  decided  to  pay,  if  the  purser  had 
nothing  on  hand  more  pressing  he  would  come 
up  and  let  them  out. 

Of  those  who  witnessed  this  wretched  steam- 
ship extortion  the  German  really  enjoyed  it;  he 
clucked  and  mimicked  before  the  coop  with 
great  gusto  and  then  scuttled  below  for  his 
camera.  He  had  scarcely  focussed  before  the 
free  Chinamen  who  knew  a  camera  were  chat- 
tering shrilly  in  hostile  groups,  the  caged  China- 
men clacking  angrily  back,  and  the  first  officer 
pounced  upon  the  photographic  outfit.  This 
collecting  of  shillings  from  the  Chinamen  and 
the  method  of  enforcement  is  no  light-hearted 
morning's  pleasure  and  is  likely  at  any  time  to 
end  seriously.  Also  it  could  be  noted  that  in  the 
immediate  background  were  others  of  the  offi- 
cers and  crew  following  operations,  and  the 
arms  rack  aft  of  the  chart- room  was  unlocked. 

Much  may  be  said  in  favor  of  the  chicken 
coop  method  for  there  was  one  time,  the  purser 
related,  that  another  purser  in  collecting  the 
shillings  used  the  fumigating  boiler  of  the  up- 
per deck.  Eight  obstinate  Chinamen  were 
shoved  in  and  the  end-lid  clamped  on.  An 
hour  of  a  dark  dungeon  would  be  better  than 


THE  FIGHTING   WHALE 


37 


the  airy  chicken  coop,  argued  the  astute  collector 
— for  the  chicken  coop  has  been  known  to  prove 
so  alluring  that  Chinamen  have  begun  serving 
on  their  second  day's  shilling  before  they  had 


WHEN  THK  HND-LID  WAS  TAKEN  OFF,  THE  BODIES   OE  EIGHT  DEAD 
CHINAMEN   WERE   TAKEN   OUT. 

paid  the  first — and  he  was  pleased  at  the  frantic 
scrabbling  that  sounded  through  the  iron  sides. 
Then  it  died  down — ah,  the  sullen  apathy  of  the 
race — and  when  the  end-lid  was  taken  off  the 


38  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

bodies  of  eight  dead  Chinamen  were  taken  out, 
suffocated.  It  was  no  end  of  trouble  to  that  pur- 
ser for  he  had  to  juggle  with  his  passenger  sheet 
and  the  various  port  officials  so  that  the  ship 
wouldn't  be  held  in  quarantine  and  make  the 
captain  and  owners  peevish  and  thereby  lose  his 
job.  Caramba,  it  was  lucky  they  were  China- 
men! 

Slowly  the  forty-eight  hours  on  the  broiling 
river  passed  away.  In  the  morning  of  its  close 
we  looked  anxiously  to  the  nearer  shore  for  the 
sign  of  official  life.  Except  for  the  straggling 
black  pigs,  all  was  lifeless  beach  and  jungle. 
The  hours  passed.  It  was  noon.  We  break- 
fasted at  that  late  Latin  hour  irritably.  Pres- 
ently the  placid  captain  sent  a  string  of  signals 
up  the  foremast.  Still  the  creek,  the  strip  of 
beach,  and  the  jungle  gave  forth  no  signs  of  life 
other  than  the  black  pigs.  More  time  passed 
and  the  captain  had  the  whistle  blown  at  inter- 
vals. No  result.  As  a  desperate  measure  he 
had  the  capstan  turned — a  bluff  for  it  was  free 
of  the  cable — but  as  the  dismal  clank  of  the 
pawls  carried  to  shore,  half  a  dozen  figures  scut- 
tled down  to  the  creek  and  tumbled  into  the  offi- 
cial boat.     A  few  minutes  later  it  was  at  the 


THE   FIGHTING   WHALE         39 

companion  ladder  and  the  port  doctor  was 
mounting  haughtily. 

Why  this  uproar?  The  sanitary  junta  had 
been  notified  of  our  arrival — what  could  one 
more?  A  reply  had  been  received  this  morning 
— or  was  it  the  day  before? — that  the  sanitary 
junta  was  very  busy,  but  would  consider  the 
quarantine  of  the  Mapocho  at  a  meeting  this 

very  night.     In  the  meantime !     He  spoke 

with  a  patient,  restrained  peevishness  as  to  an  un- 
reasonable child. 

The  august  sanitary  junta  sat  augustly  at  Gua- 
yaquil. From  this  port  doctor's  station  to  Gua- 
yaquil was  some  distance.  To  telegraph  one 
made  one's  report,  then  it  was  paddled  across  the 
muddy  tide-water  creek  in  a  dugout;  then  it  was 
carried  on  foot  across  the  island — for  this  strip 
of  beach  and  home  of  the  straggling  black  pigs 
was  but  a  portion  of  an  island  of  some  size — and 
then  across  more  water  in  a  dugout  and  there  was 
a  telegraph  station!  Naturally  all  this  took 
time.  The  port  boat  put  back  and  the  captain 
returned  to  his  quarters.  From  the  stern  again 
came  the  sickening  pop  of  firecrackers  where  the 
Chilean  crew  resumed  their  fishing,  hauling  in 
a  slender,  stupid  variety  of  catfish  and  then  toss- 


40  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

ing  it  back  with  a  well-timed  firecracker  thrust 
in  its  gaping  throat. 

We  watched  the  shabby  boat  run  on  the  beach 
and  the  port  doctor  disappear  in  the  jungle  path. 
The  crew  gathered  up  the  oars  when  suddenly 
the  doctor  darted  back,  the  crew  tumbled  into 
the  boat,  and  in  a  flurry  of  ragged  rowing  they 
came  splashing  toward  us.  Hope  revived — a 
release  from  the  august  sanitary  junta!  A  bis- 
cuit toss  off  they  stopped.  The  doctor  rose  in 
the  sternsheets  and  grandly  ordered  us  out  of 
Ecuadorean  waters ;  if  we  did  not  leave  at  once 
we  would  be  fired  upon — by  what  there  was  no 
intimation,  it  might  have  been  a  black  pig  from 
a  bamboo  catapult  for  there  was  nothing  else 
in  the  way  of  artillery — but  it  sounded  formal 
and  terrible.  So  we  left.  And  with  us  went 
five  thousand  packages  of  freight  and  ninety 
sacks  of  mail  intended  for  Guayaquil,  and  the 
furious  Ecuadorean  passengers. 

The  Peruvians  were  complacent.  "  It  is  bet- 
ter for  us,"  they  said,  "  than  to  have  to  put  into 
that  wretched  Guayaquil.  Had  we  touched 
that  fever-infected  port  we  would  have  had 
much  trouble  in  the  Peruvian  ports.  Now  we 
have  our  clean  bill  of  health  from  Panama." 


THE   FIGHTING    WHALE         41 

It  was  beautiful  optimism.  I  took  another 
look  at  the  reeking  hospital  beteewn  decks  and 
wondered  if  we  could  ever  get  into  any  port  and, 
as  I  turned  away,  two  wretched,  tottering  skele- 
tons passed  on  their  way  to  the  open  cargo  port. 
They  were  convalescing.     I  hoped  for  the  third. 

Some  time  during  the  night  we  passed  over  to 
the  Peruvian  coast  and  anchored  off  Payta  early 
the  next  morning.  Two  miles  away  a  white 
thread  of  slow  surf  broke  on  a  thin  line  of  blaz- 
ing yellow  beach;  beyond  rose  a  low  range  of 
brown-and-yellow  blufifs,  the  hot  and  arid  fringe 
of  the  long  dessert  that  edges  the  west  coast  of 
South  America.  Back  from  the  edge  of  surf 
spraddled  a  shabby,  sand-blown,  flea-bitten  town 
with  only  here  and  there  a  patch  of  gay  red- 
tiled  roof;  nowhere  a  strip  of  green  or  frond  of 
palm  to  relieve  the  arid  deadliness  of  the  brown- 
and-yellow  hills. 

Ofif  shore — there  was  neither  bay  nor  bight  in 
the  even  line  of  surf — a  deserted  brigantine  at 
anchor  dipped  slowly  with  the  long  Pacific 
swells,  its  yards  and  decks  whited  like  a  leper 
from  the  unmolested  frigate-birds  and  sea  fowl 
that  made  it  home.  Beyond,  here  and  there,  a 
patched  sail  of  no  particular  size  or  shape  was 


42 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


barely  filled  by  the  lightest  of  breezes;  occa- 
sionally, as  one  crept  past,  the  outfit  developed 
into  a  raft  on  the  after  part  of  which  was  a  rough 
platform  of  palm  on  which  were  housed  the 
Indian  fisherman  and  his  crew  or  family.  A 
few  abandoned  square  tins — the  well  known  ex- 


A    DESERTED    BRIGANTINE    AT    ANCHOR    DIPPED    SWWLY    WITH    THE 
LONG   PACIFIC   SWELI.S. 

port  tins  of  Rockefeller — held  the  drinking 
water,  an  earthen  pot  their  food,  and  on  this 
flimsy  contraption  they  would  put  out  miles  to 
sea.  In  beating  to  windward  a  loose  board  or 
piece  from  a  packing  case  is  poked  through  the 
crevices  to  act  as  centerboard. 

Slowly  creeping  over  the  ground  swells  was 
the  port  officer's  boat;  it  had  a  uniformed  crew 
and  rowed  well.  The  Peruvians  watched  it 
contentedly;  por  Dios,  no  such  stupid  work  here 


THE   FIGHTING    WHALE         43 

as  in  that  Guayas  River — buenos  dias,  Senor 
C 0 man d ante,  buenos  dias,  Senor  Doctor — and 
they  stood  aside  as  the  captain  led  the  way  into 
his  quarters,  the  procession  closing  with  the  nerv- 
ous ship's  surgeon  and  a  steward  with  a  bottle 
of  warm  champagne — for  there  was  no  more  ice. 
Presently  they  emerged  amiably  and  the  port 
officers  put  back  to  shore.  We  would  be  incom- 
municado  until  that  very  afternoon  and  then  we 
would  hear.  The  little  boats  that  had  clustered 
around  the  Mapocho  with  Panama  hats,  fruits, 
and  suspicious  looking  native  candy  were  waved 
ashore  in  a  cloud  of  disappointment.  In  the  af- 
ternoon back  came  the  boat  and  the  young  sur- 
geon prepared  to  meet  them  ceremoniously  at 
the  foot  of  the  companion  ladder.  He  could 
have  spared  himself  the  trouble;  the  little  boat 
stopped  fifty  feet  off  while  the  port  doctor 
handed  out  a  judgment  of  five  days'  quarantine. 
Twelve  dollars  and  a  half  a  head  for  the  first 
cabin  and  a  dollar  and  a  quarter,  gold,  for  the 
steerage,  and  all  additional!  Going  into  quar- 
antine was  not,  from  a  purely  business  stand- 
point, without  its  profits.  And  also  the  Ecuado- 
reans  and  the  Peruvians  once  more  met  with  a 
common  bond  of  sympathy. 


44  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

A  barefooted  Chileno  sailor  who  had  been  al- 
ready to  haul  down  the  big  yellow  pest  flag  at 
the  foremast  belayed  the  halliards  permanently 
to  the  bridge  pin  rail  and  trotted  ofif  to  help  in 
putting  over  a  small  boat.  This  boat  flying  a 
small  yellow  flag,  was  anchored  a  half-mile  away 
and  during  the  days  of  quarantine  was  the  only 
means  of  communication  with  the  shore.  Each 
morning  through  the  medium  of  this  anchored 
boat  we  did  the  ship's  business  with  the  shore 
and  from  it  the  steward  would  return  with  water- 
melons, eggs,  turkeys,  ducks,  and  vegetables  and 
quinine  for  the  doctor.  Occasionally  from  day 
to  day  the  port  doctor,  the  port  captain,  or  a 
member  of  the  sanitary  junta  would  be  rowed 
out  in  the  official  boat  to  look  us  over  and  the 
tottering  wrecks  between  the  decks  would  be 
mustered  at  an  open  cargo  port  for  a  distant  and 
sceptical  inspection.  The  local  steamship  agents, 
through  the  daily  messages  in  the  anchored  boat, 
kept  us  interested  with  the  daily  rumors — we 
were  a  plague  ship,  a  floating  charnel  house  ply- 
ing our  way  shamelessly  from  port  to  port,  a 
leper  of  the  high  seas  shunned  even  by  Guaya- 
quil— and  one  vague  and  indefinite  that  seemed 
to  suggest  that  a  port  official  contemplated  a  sea 


THE   FIGHTING    WHALE 


45 


trip  in  a  week  or  so  and  was  engineering  this 
means  of  giving  us  the  pleasure  of  his  company 
when  he  was  ready.     It  was  interesting. 


CHAPTER  III 

THROUGH  A  TROPICAL  QUARANTINE 

ONE  morning  when  the  official  sanitary 
junta^ — the  port  doctor,  the  town  drug- 
gist, and  three  shopkeepers,  all  of  whom 
except  the  first,  were  contentedly  selling  us  sup- 
plies— were  making  their  inspection  within  easy 
hailing  distance  the  returning  Peruvian  diplo- 
mat dealt  himself  a  hand  in  the  game.  In  a 
few  pointed  remarks  he  demanded  that  they 
send  a  doctor  on  board  to  make  an  examination. 
The  port  captain  returned  an  indignant  oration 
in  which,  after  paying  tribute  to  the  ancestral 
deeds  of  the  diplomat's  forebears,  he  hurled 
shame  at  the  diplomat  for  his  selfish  lack  of 
patriotism  in  so  distrusting  the  conclusions  and 
acts  of  his  countrymen,  obviously  he  had  been 
so  enervated  by  effete  foreign  associations  that 
— that — well,  it  sounded  like  good  oratory  any- 
way.   There  was  no  doubt  in  their  minds  that 

we  were  concealing  yellow  fever. 

46 


A   TROPICAL  QUARANTINE     47 

Slowly  the  five  days  of  quarantine  passed  with 
this  solemn  official  mockery.  The  Chinamen 
ceased  from  troubling  and  yielded  the  daily 
shilling,  the  chicken  coop  was  returned  to  the 
authority  of  the  steward — although  once,  for 
variety,  a  Chinaman  shared  it  with  a  couple  of 
turkeys  for  some  hours — and  then  the  final  day 
arrived. 

Leisurely  the  official  boat  rowed  out.  The 
passengers  for  Ecuador,  it  announced,  were  to 
be  transferred  to  the  leprous-looking  brigantine 
where  they  would  remain  in  quarantine  until 
they  could  be  transfered  to  a  northbound 
steamer.  Incidentally  they  were  privileged  to 
pay  twelve  sols  a  day,  each,  for  board.  Then 
the  official  boat  was  rowed  back;  and  that  was 
all. 

Indignantly  the  passengers  met  and  decided  to 
pay  no  more  daily  quarantine  charges — it  seemed 
as  if  the  company  needed  a  little  stimulating, 
perhaps;  the  purser  chuckled  sympathetically 
and  then  a  self-appointed  committee  looked  over 
the  chicken  coop  with  a  speculative  eye.  It  was 
heartening,  for  at  least  the  monotony  would  be 
broken.  That  night  an  unofficial  boat  stole  out 
of  the  darkness  alongside;  confirmed  the  rumor 


48  'ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

that  the  port  captain  was  holding  us  for  a  week 
longer  to  suit  his  convenience;  then  the  mes- 
senger disappeared  in  the  night.  This  was 
interesting  as  pure  news  matter  and  that  was 
all. 

Came  the  morning  of  the  sixth  day  without 
change.  And  then  the  diplomat's  cables  to 
Lima  had  effect.  A  doctor  had  been  appointed 
on  a  cabled  order  from  Lima  to  make  a  real  ex- 
amination; he  came  out  accompanied  by  a  sani- 
tary junta  of  very  sour  officials,  climbed  on 
board,  and  began  his  work.  They  pulled  away 
and  returned  in  the  afternoon. 

The  young  ship's  surgeon  and  the  new  doctor 
shouted  the  report  across  the  water.  Barring 
the  three  cases  of  malarial  fever  between  decks 
we  had  a  clean  bill  of  health.  The  official  boat 
drew  a  trifle  nearer;  in  the  stern  sheets  the  port 
doctor  scanned  a  formidable  looking  medical 
volume  that  lay  open  on  his  knees  and  the  drug- 
gist bent  his  head  over  the  same  pages.  Sol- 
emnly they  accepted  little  test  tubes  that  the 
ship's  surgeon  passed  across  to  them  and  ex- 
amined them  gravely.  They  turned  a  few  pages 
of  the  book  and  asked  a  question.  The  new  doc- 
tor answered  it  promptly.     Again  they  shuffled 


A    TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     49 

the  pages  and  came 
back  with  another; 
another  answer,  and 
then  more  hasty 
poring. 

At  length  came 
their  decision:  it 
was  true  that  the  ex- 
cellent  doctors   had 


described 


such 

were 

for 

fever 


WHAT   TH^   DIPLOMAT   SAID   WAS   DI- 
RECT  AND   VOLUBLE. 


no 
symptoms  as 
standardized 
either  yellow 
or  the  peste  bubon- 
ica,  but  there  was 
nothing  to  prevent 
those  doctors  from 
stating  and  confirming  that  which  was  not  true; 
therefore  be  it  resolved  that  we  had  yellow 
fever,  but  were  concealing  it!  They  were  the 
incorruptible  guardians  of  a  nation's  health. 

What  the  diplomat  said  was  direct  and  voluble 
and  carried  perfectly  across  the  calm  evening 
sea :  Heaven  was  a  sad  witness  of  his  unpatriotic 
perfidy  for  he  threatened  them  with  a  touch  of 
patriotism  direct  from  Lima  upon  the  hour  of 


50  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

his  arrival — however  distant  or  uncertain  that 
might  be.  A  little  conference  and  they  voted  on 
our  admission,  two  and  two — could  anything  be 
fairer!  Their  honest  hearts  thanked  Heaven 
for  the  thought  of  this  simple  and  adroit  dead- 
lock that  preserved  their  official  activities  and  at 
the  same  time  kept  us  in  a  profitable  quarantine. 
Tersely  it  was  pointed  out  by  the  diplomat  that 
by  virtue  of  the  cabled  commission  the  new 
doctor  was  a  member  of  the  board — vote  again! 

That  evening  we  wandered  through  the  dust 
and  sand  of  Payta  and  rode  grandly,  and  briefly, 
to  the  out-skirts  of  the  town  in  the  single  mule- 
and-rope  tram  that  skirted  the  beach.  It  is  well 
in  the  troubled  times  of  quarantine  on  the  West 
Coast  always  to  travel  with  an  accredited  diplo- 
mat on  board. 

All  next  day  the  whirr  and  clatter  of  the  steam- 
winches  and  the  bang  of  cargo  kept  up  and  again 
we  visited  the  dusty  port,  wading  through  the 
lines  of  Panama  hat  sellers  that  lined  up  to  greet 
the  landing  of  our  small  boat.  Of  hotel  runners 
there  were  none,  this  being  due  to  the  fact  that 
there  was  but  one  hotel  to  which  the  stray  custom 
is  bound  to  drift.  At  the  hotel  we  saw  a  few 
palms  and  tropical  blooms  in  tubs  and  in  a  care- 


C/3 

> 

C>0 


O 

x: 

c 

CO 


C 


3 


< 


A    TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     51 

fully  irrigated  patio,  for  Payta  is — like  all  that 
West  Coast — rainless.  As  a  cold  matter  of 
meteorological  fact  it  does  rain  sometimes ;  I  ac- 
cidentally started  an  acrimonious  discussion  by  a 
merely  polite  remark  on  the  weather  as  to 
whether  it  had  been  nine,  eleven,  or  fourteen 
years  since  the  last  rain.  In  apparent  proof  of 
this  there  is  a  wide,  dusty  canal  bulkheaded  with 
piling  on  either  side  which  in  these  intervals  be- 
tween showers  serves  as  a  native  market.  Little 
red  flags  flutter  from  the  chicherias  where  the 
opaque,  yellow,  Indian  corn  beer  is  sold,  rang- 
ing in  flavor  and  potency  from  warm  buttermilk 
to  the  wicked  "  stone-fence  "  of  New  Jersey. 

Back  of  the  town  a  trail  wades  through  the 
sand  to  the  crest  of  the  long  bluffs ;  the  feet  of 
countless  pack  trains  have  worn  a  driveway 
through  the  ridge  until,  stepping  through,  there 
are  suddenly  spread  before  the  view  the  endless 
stretches  of  a  dried  and  dusty  desert  that  has  been 
an  ocean's  prehistoric  bed.  The  hot  airs  quiver 
and  boil  from  the  twisting  valleys  or  ridges  of 
blistering  sand  and  rock  and  through  the  pulsing 
heat  the  occasional  pack  train  in  the  distance 
turns  to  a  wavering,  shimmering  thread.  To 
the  imagination  a  desert  rises  as  a  dull,  gray  ex- 


52 


u4CR0SS   THE   ANDES 


CI,OSe    RElSEMBIvANC]^    TO    AN    ARMY    OF    DRUNKEN    BUGS. 

panse  endless  in  its  colorless  monotony;  here 
there  was  a  riot  of  color,  every  hue,  raw  and 
gorgeous — except  green — from  the  soft  purples 
and  cool  sapphire  of  the  shadows  to  the  blazing 
yellows  and  reds  and  white  of  the  open  spaces. 
And  in  the  garish  stretch  of  a  dead  ocean  there 
slowly  rises  like  a  parching  thirst  a  longing  for 
a  sweep  of  tender  green. 

The  little  governmental  touch  from  Lima 
had  cleared  the  path  of  quarantine  and  we  began 
a  dot-and-carry-one  course  down  the  coast  from 
Payta;  every  day  our  winches  whirred  and  clat- 
tered off  some  dusty,  sand-blown  port.  Before 
our  anchor  had  touched  bottom  in  the  open  road- 
stead a  fleet  of  lanchas,  heavy,  double-ended, 
open  lighters  of  from  ten  to  twenty-five  tons  ca- 
pacity were  crawling  over  the  water;  the  dozen 
long  oars  that  were  their  means  of  locomotion — ■ 
and  that  were  manipulated  on  an  independent 


J 


A    TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     53 

competitive  basis — spraddled  on  each  side  gave 
the  fleet  a  close  resemblance  to  an  army  of 
drunken  bugs  struggling  forward  on  uncertain 
legs.  There  was  always  a  race  to  the  Mapocho's 
side  and  the  first  to  get  there  caught  the  heaving 
line. 

Once  a  lancha  defeated  in  a  close  finish  came 
on  and  cut  the  heaving  line  so  that  its  rival  was 
left  with  the  useless  section  while  it  hurriedly 
hauled  in  on  the  hawser.  Instantly  a  fine  naval 
engagement  was  in  progress  as  the  lanchas 
locked  like  a  couple  of  old  Carthaginian  gal- 
leys. By  the  aid  of  force  peace  was  established 
and  the  rightful  and  original  award  of  the 
hawser  sustained;  had  it  not  been,  as  the  first 
officer  explained,  they  would  need  a  new  heav- 
ing line  at  every  port. 

The  bluffs  of  the  coast  gave  way  to  hills  and 
these  in  turn  to  higher  ones;  the  Andes  were 
closing  in  on  the  Pacific.  At  times  the  great 
mountain  chain  towered  from  the  very  water's 
edge  in  a  succession  of  steep  cliffs,  each  receding 
tier  softening  in  the  distance  and  rising  through 
the  slowly  shifting  strata  of  clouds  until  only 
the  gashes  of  white  snow  picked  out  the  tower- 
ing peaks.  Here  and  there  steep,  rocky  islets 
fringed  the  coast  line  and  we  stood  far  out  to  save 
the  chances,  and  yet  there  was  no  appreciable 


54  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

change  in  the  proportions  of  the  tremendous 
mountain  range.  The  sense  of  proportion  and 
distance  was  lost  in  the  comparison  of  these  vast 
reaches.  A  rocky  islet,  a  steep  sugar-loaf  affair, 
rose  from  the  ocean  perhaps  five  feet — not  much 
as  an  island  or  a  mountain  peak.  Through  the 
binoculars  a  tiny  unknown  speck  at  the  base  de- 
veloped  into  a  full-rigged  bark  with  tapering 
masts  above  which  the  sugar-loaf  rock  rose  for 
thousands  of  feet  in  the  clear  air,  and  on  it  was 
a  wretched  colony  of  guano  workers. 

Then  the  coast  opened  out  into  level  reaches 
again  with  occasional  lines  of  irrigation  ditches 
showing  a  thread  of  green.  Occasionally — 
twice  I  think — there  was  actually  a  landlocked 
harbor.  It  was  one  of  these,  Chimbote,  that 
James  G.  Blaine  proposed  to  use  or  secure  as  a 
naval  base  and  coaling  station.  It  is  perfectly 
sheltered  with  a  narrow,  bottle-neck  entrance 
guarded  by  a  rocky  island  in  the  middle  which  is 
covered  with  a  wriggling  film  of  seals  that  are 
perfectly  indifferent  to  the  close  passage  of  ships 
or  men. 

In  this  harbor  rode  the  queerest  of  sea-going 
craft.  In  Mexico  I  had  once  seen  a  Chinaman 
fit  himself  up  a  home  from  about  eight  feet  of 


Every  Day  our  Winches  Whirred  and  Clattered  off  some  Dusty; 
Sand-blown  Port 


A    TROPICAL    QUARANTINE     55 

one  end  of  a  hopelessly  wrecked  dugout,  take  in  a 
partner,  and  then  the  two  of  them  paddle  off  up 
the  river  in  the  fishing  business,  sleeping  and 
eating  aboard  the  flat-iron  shaped  thing.  Here 
in  this  case  was  a  bow  and  stern  bolted  together 
without  a  midship  section.  And  both  the  bow 
and  stern  were  those  of  a  fairly  full  size  tramp 
freighter.  The  bow  was  the  ram  bow  of  a  war 
ship  and  back  of  it  there  was  barely  room  to 
squeeze  in  a  capstan  and  a  tiny  hatch;  the  fore- 
mast shared  the  bridge,  a  funnel  and  whistle 
jammed  themselves  up  against  the  bridge,  while 
the  short  distance  to  the  stern  rail  gave  room  for 
a  squat  cabin  out  of  which  rose  the  mainmast. 
A  score  of  Chimbote  lanchas  were  as  big — big- 
ger— and  where  this  telescoped  liner  would  find 
room  for  cargo  or  coal  after  providing  for  en- 
gines and  a  galley  is  a  mystery.  Yet  it  does 
carry  cargo  and  ambles  along  from  port  to  port 
a  tragic  marvel  of  compression. 

The  day  before,  off  Huanchazo,  where  a  storm 
far  out  had  piled  up  a  heavy,  oily  groundswell, 
that  even  put  the  racks  on  the  tables,  a  wealthy 
old  Peruvian  lady  had  been  hoisted  abroad  in  a 
cask  clinging  to  her  son.  She  was  a  garrulous 
old  soul,  powdered  like  a  marshmallow,  with 


56  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

three  chins  and  a  little  moustache,  and  her  son 
was  the  very  apple  of  her  eye.  Therefore,  son 
was  what  one  might  expect.  His  adolescent  and 
mature  ambition  was  to  be  the  amorous  cut-up  of 
the  coast  and  so  far  he  had  succeeded  generously 
in  making  a  smug,  self-satisfied  nuisance  of  him- 
self. He  counted  doting  mother's  allowance 
publicly,  drank  warm  champagne  noisily  when 
thrifty  mother  was  not  around,  and  dressed  in 
the  Huanchazo  idea  of  French  fashions  for  men. 
In  the  morning  he  did  not  appear.  Mother  ex- 
plained fondly — but  not  the  truth.  She  did  not 
know  it. 

Passengers  are  warned  not  to  go  between  decks 
after  dark,  the  steerage  hutches  and  the  crew 
have  the  freedom  of  that  deck.  Son  prowled 
down  on  some  shifty  little  romantic  project  of 
his  own.  In  the  darkness  he  suddenly  felt  two 
sharp  little  pricks  in  the  skin  of  his  back  and  one 
sharp  little  prod  in  front;  they  felt  very,  very 
much  like  the  points  of  knives.  Up  went  son's 
hands  promptly  and  in  the  blackness  he  felt 
heavy  hands  pulling  out  his  maternal  allowance 
— the  beautiful  money  with  which  he  was  to 
flaunt  his  fascinations  in  Lima.  Hence  no  Li- 
manean  gay  life — mother  it  seemed  was  a  thrifty 


A    TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     57 

Spartan  in  money  matters — and  son  was  in  his 
berth,  weeping.  A  steward  told  us  the  latter, 
confidentially  of  course. 

Samancho,  Chimbote,  Salivari,  Suppe,  and 
then  at  last,  in  the  daybreak  of  the  morning  after 
the  last  named  and  in  the  midst  of  a  soft,  clouded 
day,  Callao.  There  was  the  usual  customs 
search  of  the  baggage — a  maddening  process  to 
an  Englishman,  mildly  irritating  to  a  French- 
man, and  accepted  meekly  and  placidly  by 
Americans  as  a  matter  of  course  from  a  thorough 
training  in  our  own  home  ports.  I  have  never 
passed  through  any  country  that  could  give  as 
close  an  imitation  of  our  own  thorough  methods 
of  dock  robbery  and  tariff  brigandage  as  Peru. 
A  quarter  of  an  hour  by  train  through  a  rich 
soil  that  can  be  worked  only  by  irrigation  and 
Lima,  the  first  halt  on  the  continent,  has  been 
attained. 

For  two  weeks  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  to 
idle  in  Lima.  A  delightful  city  full  of  the  old 
contrasts  of  highly  civilized,  sybaritic  pleasures 
alongside  of  the  squalid,  aimless  poverty  of  the 
survivors  of  a  devastated  empire.  There  is  the 
Bois  where  fashionable  equipages  with  cockaded, 
copper-colored  lackeys — possibly  in  bare  or  san- 


58  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

daled  feet —  on  the  box,  silver-mounted  harness 
and  heavy,  Chilean  bred  coach  horses  jingle  past 
in  procession  on  Sunday  afternoons  while  some 
gallant  Peruano  lopes  alongside  with  huge  silver 
stirrups  and  a  saddle  almost  solid  with  bullion; 
the  sodden  side  streets  where  the  buzzard  and  the 
scavenger  pig  are  man's  best  friend ;  the  cathe- 
dral where  lies  the  dessicated  body  of  Pizarro 
in  a  marble  casket  like  an  aquarium,  the  one  open 
side  covered  with  glass  through  which  may  be 
seen  the  remains  of  that  treacherous  old  buc- 
caneer, with  his  head  re-fastened  by  a  silver  wire 
to  guard  against  a  repetition  of  the  theft;  the 
cathedral  itself  with  its  murky  interior  smoked 
by  the  votive  candles  of  millions  of  conscript 
converts ;  its  queer  carvings  where  the  ecclesias- 
tical memories  of  architecture  have  been  freely 
rendered  by  the  Indian  stone-  cutters ;  the  clubs, 
the  cafes — and  the  ambrosial  coffee — chapels 
with  the  bullion  covered  walls,  the  wretched 
tobacco  at  high  tariff — extorted  prices — all  these 
and  then  the  Hotel  Maury. 

Peace  be  to  Savarin,  to  Delmonico,  and  to 
Chamberlain.  They  did  well  in  their  way.  But 
they  never  served  a  squid,  or  cuttlefish,  floating 
like  a  small  hjt- water  bottle,  tender  and  delici- 


Lima  a  Delightful  City  cA  Contrasts 


d   TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     59 

ous  in  an  inky  sauce  of  their  own  founding;  nor 
a  starfish  sprawled  in  a  five-pointed  dream  of 
savory,  lobster-like  succulence;  nor  '' sefioritas" 
— a  delicate  species  of  scallop — each  with  its 
tiny  scarlet  tongue  draped  across  the  pearl-white 
bivalve  bosom  and  that,  steamed  or  not,  melted 
in  one  supreme  ecstatic  flavor;  nor  five  inch 
langostin  fresh  from  the  cold  waters  of  the  An- 
dean hills,  nor  compounded  or  invented  a  straw- 
berry gin  cocktail  of  surpassing  allurement — 
cooled  by  a  piece  of  ice  kept  in  a  flannel-lined 
drawer  and  returned  thereto  after  stirring. 
None  of  these  things  had  they  and  so  by  just 
that  much  they  fell  short. 

In  the  Hotel  Maury  there  was  a  written  bill 
of  fare  for  those  who  could  merely  read.  But 
for  the  expert,  the  fastidious — or  the  adventur- 
ous— there  was  a  redoubt  in  the  main  room 
whose  flanking  bastions  and  crest  were  a  solid  ar- 
ray of  great  joints  and  little  joints,  steaks,  chops, 
unnamed  fish  in  platoons  and  senoritas  in  bri- 
gades, fruits,  vegetables  and  all  of  the  foregoing 
— and  more — laid  out  in  tiers  and  terraces  whose 
foundations  were  of  cool,  inviting  seaweeds  and 
mosses,  and  still  further  seductively  embellished 
with  a  variety  of  paper  ribbons  and  crests  and 


I 


6o  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

cockades  until  one  almost  lost  sight  of  the  pago- 
das of  gaudy,  many-storied  cakes  and  confec- 
tions that  rose  like  watch  towers  at  judicious  in- 
tervals along  the  battlements.  It  was  a  salon. 
To  the  shuffling,  woolen-capped,  sandaled,  or 
bare-footed  Indian  at  one's  heels  the  directions 
were  given,  you  chose  what  you  would  as  they 
thus  reposed  in  the  altogether  and  then  repaired 
to  await  in  a  sawdust-floored  cavern  at  one  side 
and  in  a  state  of  serene  and  expectant  bliss  the 
certain  pleasures  of  the  very  immediate  future. 
You  waited,  it  is  true,  at  a  warped  table  with  a 
stained  cloth  on  which  a  bent  cruet  supplied  the 
only  note  of  elegence.  And,  lest  any  of  the  pre- 
cious viands  be  lost  in  transit  or  breakage,  you 
knew  that  you  would  be  served  with  a  substantial, 
hard-shell  crockery  only  slightly  more  vulner- 
able than  reinforced  concrete.  Presently  your 
Indian  reappeared  in  a  shuffling  trot  scattering 
sawdust  from  the  prow  of  each  sandal  like  a  har- 
bor pile-driver  under  full  speed — the  hard-shell 
crockery  is  white  hot,  but  he  has  the  hands  of  a 
salamander — and  then  with  a  flourish  he  drops 
an  assorted  collection  of  tableware  somewhere 
within  reach — you  are  served.  And  what  a  re- 
past!    Peace  be  to  Savarin,  Delmonico  and — 


I 


A    TROPICAL   QUARANTINE     6i 

enough.  Comparisons  are  invidious  and  the 
Maury  can  stand  alone  in  the  continent  of  his 
choosing. 

Very  shortly  the  sailing  day  came  for,  since 
it  was  not  possible  to  land  in  Mollendo  owing  to 
that  port  being  afflicted  with  a  quarantine,  it  had 
been  necessary  to  catch  a  steamer  that  would  put 
us  through  the  surf  at  Quilca,  a  hole  in  a  cliff 
that  has  its  only  function  in  these  times  of  quar- 
antine. A  farewell  inspection  of  the  redoubt  and 
and  bastions,  a  recharging  of  the  bottle  of  salicy- 
lic acid  and  alcohol,  which  while  it  had  in  no 
way  abated  the  fleas  of  the  Hotel  Maury,  yet  had 
mitigated  their  consequences,  and  Lima  and  Cal- 
lao  drifted  into  the  background  with  the  closing 
day.  From  Quilca  in  some  way  we  would  con- 
nect by  muleback  and  packtrain  across  the  desert 
to  the  desert  station  of  La  Joya  with  the  railroad 
to  Arequipa  and  thence  to  Lake  Titicaca  and 
across  to  La  Paz. 


CHAPTER  IV 

A  FORCED  MARCH  ACROSS  THE  DESERT  OF  ATACAMA 

THE  Stand-by  bell  of  the  Limari  tinkled 
from  her  engine-room,  our  baggage  and 
freight  were  safely  stowed  in  the  wallow- 
ing Peruvian  lanchas  alongside,  and  the  Bolivian 
mail  followed.  The  Captain  of  the  Port  and 
the  Inspector  of  Customs  balanced  down  the 
swaying  gangway  and  dropped  into  the  gig 
alongside.    We  followed. 

Before  us  stretched  the  long,  barren  line  of 
rocky  coast,  fading  away  in  the  soft  mist  of  a 
Peruvian  winter.  For  it  is  winter  here,  damp 
and  chill,  in  September.  Directly  ahead  is  a 
narrow,  ragged  break  in  the  cliffs.  Inside  is 
Quilca,  the  side  door  to  La  Paz  in  days  of  quar- 
antine. 

We  cross  the  barrier  of  half-concealed  rock 
before  us,  and  soon  we  are  in  the  smooth  waters 
of  the  canon  beyond.    On  either  side  the  red  vol- 

62 


I 


THE  DESERT   OF  ATACAMA    63 

canic  bluffs  rise  for  perhaps  two  hundred  feet, 
their  faces  scarred  and  seamed  or  beaten  into 
grotesque  forms  by  the  Pacific  of  ages  past.  Up 
this  defile  we  rowed  for  several  hundred  yards, 
then  we  rounded  a  ragged  promontory,  and  the 
full  glories  of  the  metropolis  of  Quilca  burst 
upon  us.  A  broken  flight  of  steps  led  from  the 
water,  and,  back  of  it  all,  two  thin  straggling 
lines  of  woven-cane  huts  bounded  the  solitary 
street.  Two  houses,  more  dismally  pretentious 
than  the  rest,  with  mud  walls  and  corrugated- 
iron  roofs,  marked  the  local  seat  of  government. 
In  the  distance  rose  the  red  volcanic  hills,  dull, 
flat,  and  shadowless  under  the  clouded  sky  of 
the  tropical  winter.     This  was  all  of  Quilca. 

We  had  cabled  from  Lima  for  horses  and  a 
pack-train  to  meet  us  and  bring  us  over  the 
desert  of  San  Jose,  where  we  could  get  the  train 
to  the  interior. 

The  morning  after  our  arrival  we  were  awak- 
ened by  the  clatter  of  the  pack-mules  as  they 
passed  our  quarters,  and  the  '^ Hola,  holaf 
Huish,  huishr^  of  their  arrieros.  It  was  our 
train. 

In  the  middle  of  the  lone  street  the  arrieros 
were  busy  lashing  our  smaller  packages  in  raw- 


64  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

hide  nets.  Scattered  about  in  the  sand  were  the 
larger  cases  of  freight — prospecting  machinery 
and  mining  hardware — amounting  to  a  little 
over  a  ton  in  weight;  and  still  under  the  guard 
of  Agamemnon  in  our  quarters  of  the  night  was 
the  personal  equipment — trunks,  instruments, 
rifles,  shotguns,  cartridges  and  powder  and  shot 
■ — making  nineteen  hundred  pounds  more.  And 
blocking  the  only  thoroughfare  of  Quilca  were 
the  twelve  pack-mules — long-haired,  discon- 
solate animals,  with  pepper-and-salt  complex- 
ions, save  where  patches  of  bare  hide  showed 
the  chafing  of  the  pack-ropes.  They  looked  as 
though  our  own  regulation  army  load  of  two 
hundred  pounds  per  mule  would  be  far  too  great. 
And  they  were  to  divide  four  thousand  pounds 
among  them. 

It  was  eleven  o'clock  in  the  forenoon  when  the 
last  diamond-hitch  was  thrown  and  the  last  pack 
lashed  in  place.  The  arrieros  swung  their  long, 
knotted  rawhide  thongs,  the  saddle-galled  bell- 
mare  clanged  as  she  led  the  way,  and  we  climbed 
into  our  saddles  and  fell  in  behind  the  straggling 
mules  as  they  led  the  way  up  the  dismal  street 
and  out  into  the  desert. 

The  trail  rose  sharply  as  it  left  Quilca,  and 


t 


THE   DESERT  OF  ATACAMA    65 

then  wound  around  to  the  right,  where  it  joined 
the  old  desert  road  used  by  the  Spaniards  after 
their  conquest,  and  for  centuries  before  that  by 
the  Incas  in  their  barter  with  the  coast.  On  each 
side  rose  white  walls  of  rotten  rock,  higher  than 
our  heads  as  we  rode  by,  the  path  between  them 
worn  down  by  plodding  hoofs  for  untold  ages. 
Upon  this  path  the  rock  was  ground  to  a  fine 
white  powder  that  rose  in  clouds  and  covered 
us  until  we  looked  ahead  as  through  the  mists 
of  a  fog.  Vaguely,  over  the  walls,  the  ragged 
volcanic  hills  silhouetted  against  the  sky. 

We  kept  on  ascending  between  these  winding 
walls,  at  length  emerging  on  a  narrow  table-land 
' — the  top  of  the  cliffs  we  had  seen  from  the  decks 
of  the  Limari,  A  short  distance  over  the  level 
ground,  and  then  from  the  farther  edge  we 
looked  down  on  the  flat,  stony  bottom  of  the 
Vitor  Valley — a  ragged  gorge  that  wound  a  tor- 
tuous course  through  the  desert.  A  narrow  trail 
with  short,  sharp  angles  zigzagged  down  a  steep 
gully  to  the  bottom.  The  mules  carefully  picked 
their  way  down  among  the  loose  stones,  halting 
inquiringly  at  times  to  choose  perhaps  a  shorter 
cut.  If  it  seemed  to  their  instinct  feasible,  they 
gathered  their  hind  legs  under  them,  their  front 


66  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

hoofs  sticking  stiffly  out  in  front,  and  slid  down 
on  their  bellies,  in  a  cloud  of  dust,  carrying  with 
them  a  small  avalanche  of  loose  shale  as  they 
landed  in  a  section  of  the  trail  below. 

You  sit  back  in  your  saddle — all  saddles  in 
these  parts  have  cruppers  and  breastplates  to  pre- 
vent your  sliding  over  the  animal's  ears  as  you  go 
down  or  slipping  off  behind  as  you  go  up  a  moun- 
tain path — and  as  you  watch  the  tossing  line  of 
packs  below,  the  speculation  forces  itself  as  to  the 
consequences  of  a  mule's  misstep.  That  it  is  not 
all  idle  speculation  is  shown  by  the  scattered 
skeletons  below  in  the  valley,  bleached  to  vary- 
ing degrees  of  dull  white. 

We  do  not  descend  to  the  pavement  of  river- 
washed  stones  on  the  bed  of  the  valley.  Twenty 
yards  above,  the  trail  leads  abruptly  off  to  the 
left  into  a  narrow  ditch  worn  in  the  face  of  the 
cliff,  which  in  places  has  been  scooped  out  to  al- 
low for  the  width  of  the  packs,  leaving  an  inse- 
cure overhang  of  rock  above. 

For  miles  we  followed  the  contour  of  the  val- 
ley, clinging  to  the  steep  slopes  and  the  sides  of 
the  cliffs  that  hedged  it  in.  Then  down  a  clayey 
bank  the  trail  started  diagonally  across  the  bot- 
tom of  the  valley  to  the  farther  side.     Occasion- 


THE  DESERT  OF  ATACAMA    67 

ally  we  would  come  suddenly  on  a  little  clearing 
where  two  or  three  Indians,  grisly  through  the 
ashen  grime,  were  burning  charcoal — little  twigs 
scarcely  bigger  than  one's  finger.  We  came  out 
at  the  farther  side  of  the  valley  against  the  cliffs 
of  the  mesa  beyond.  On  the  little  stony  flat  be- 
fore them,  three  straggling  huts  of  woven  cane 
with  thatched  roofs  of  barley  straw  marked  a 
lonely  hacienda.  A  few  dirty  Indians  and  their 
slatternly  wives  lounged  about.  A  short  dis- 
tance beyond,  the  trail  led  over  the  steep  talus  at 
the  base  of  the  cliffs ;  then  on  up  through  a  nar- 
row, wedge-shaped  crevice  that  wound  back  and 
forth  in  short  ascending  turns,  till  it  disappeared 
over  the  edge  of  the  mesa  a  thousand  feet  above. 
For  miles  on  either  side  it  was  the  only  break  in 
the  cliff;  and  as  we  looked  at  the  stiff  prospect 
ahead  of  us,  the  rocky  descent  of  a  few  hours  be- 
fore seemed  like  gentle  morning  exercise  in  the 
park. 

For  a  short  distance  the  trail  ran  straight  up 
over  the  loose  shale ;  then  the  real  ascent  began. 
Ten  yards  to  the  right,  then  ten  to  the  left,  and 
steeper  with  each  change.  The  mules  humped 
their  backs  and  scratched  along  on  the  toe  of  the 
hoof,  choosing  their  foothold  with  the  nice  pre- 


68  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

cision  of  a  cat  crossing  a  sprinkled  street.  Two 
turns  to  the  right,  then  two  to  the  left;  then  a  rest 
of  half  a  minute,  when  without  urging  they 
would  recommence  the  ascent.  Slowly  and  tedi- 
ously we  climbed,  and  finally  rode  out  on  a 
broad,  level  plateau  that  stretched  away  and 
merged  with  the  desert  hills  of  the  distance.  Be- 
low us  toiled  our  pack-train,  tediously  weaving 
back  and  forth  on  the  zigzag  trail.  As  each 
section  reached  the  level  ground,  the  arriero  dis- 
mounted and  went  among  his  animals,  talking 
mule-talk  and  easing  loads  to  a  better  balance  or 
tightening  the  stretched  cinches.  All  the  un- 
kept,  hairy  sides  were  heaving  with  heavy 
breaths.  A  few  lay  down — a  bad  sign  in  a  pack- 
animal.  But  in  twenty  minutes  every  mule  was 
apparently  as  fresh  as  ever,  wandering  about  and 
foraging  on  the  stiff,  wiry  bunch-grass  of  the 
arid  soil.  And  when  we  started  they  stepped  off 
easily  under  their  loads,  with  their  long  ears 
briskly  flapping.  The  two  small  arrieros  left  us 
here  and  returned  to  Quilca,  for  the  chief  dif- 
ficulties were  passed,  and  the  rest  was  but  per- 
sistent plodding  over  the  desert  to  San  Jose. 

The  trail  over  the  plateau  had  been  worn  in 
parallel  furrows  like  the  thin  strip  of  a  newly 


THE   DESERT   OF  ATACAMA     69 

ploughed  field.  Each  mule  chose  his  furrow 
and  insistently  walked  there,  resenting  the  effort 
of  any  of  the  others  to  get  in  ahead  of  him. 
When  a  collision  occurred  you  could  hear  the 
rattle  of  nail-kegs  and  the  clatter  of  shovels, 
picks,  and  hardware  a  half-mile  off  as  they 
butted  and  shoved  for  the  right  of  way.  Our 
two  remaining  arrieros  rode  in  the  rear,  muffled 
in  their  gaudy  woolen  ponchos.  Occasionally  a 
lean  arm  would  shoot  out  from  under  its  folds 
and  the  knotted  thong  bite  the  flank  of  some  lag- 
ging mule.  These  mule-drivers'  thongs  are  long, 
braided  strips  of  rawhide  spliced  into  the  curb- 
rein — they  use  no  snaffle — ending  in  a  heavy 
knot.  Its  twelve  or  fourteen  feet  lie  coiled  in 
the  bridle-hand  until  called  into  service.  Then 
with  a  twist  of  the  wrist,  it  feeds  rapidly  out 
through  the  right  hand,  humming  like  a  sawmill 
as  it  circles  round  his  head,  and  landing  with  a 
thwack  that  generally  corrects  the  indisposition 
for  which  it  is  intended.  Often  the  arrieros  imi- 
tate its  vicious  hum,  and  it  will  frequently  prove 
sufficient. 

The  trail  was  distinct  enough — there  was  no 
fear  of  wandering  away  from  it — a  slender  ditch 
worn  in  the  bed  of  the  arroyo.     Here  and  there 


70  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

a  ragged  little  hole  dug  in  the  soft  walls  of  white 
rock  marked  the  lonely  home  of  some  desert  bad- 
ger ;  and  again  we  would  ride  past  whole  colonies 
of  them.  In  these  badger  villages  the  holes 
fairly  honeycombed  the  sides  of  the  trail  and  the 
bluff  walls  of  the  arroyos,  and  the  shuffling  claw- 
marks  of  the  badger  trails  scarred  the  dust  in  all 
directions.  There  were  no  other  signs  of  life; 
not  even  the  scaly  windings  of  a  lizard  were  to 
be  seen,  and  the  sparse  patches  of  bunch-grass 
had  long  since  disappeared. 

Mile  after  mile  we  pushed  up  these  narrow 
valleys.  The  badger-holes  disappeared,  and 
strange  desert  growths  began  to  appear  from 
time  to  time.  As  we  had  ascended,  the  clouds 
had  seemed  to  lower,  and  now  we  could  see  on 
either  hand  the  light  mists  floating  about  us. 

One  more  steep  loomed  ahead.  We  pushed 
through  the  damp  strata  of  mists  clinging  to  its 
sides,  and  came  out  on  the  flat  land  above  in  the 
long  level  rays  of  the  setting  sun.  Below  us, 
over  the  clouds,  it  cast  its  cold,  blue  shadows 
and  sparkling  high  lights,  transforming  those 
shifting,  unstable  vapors  into  rippling  waves  of 
golden  foam.  To  the  east  the  whole  desert 
glowed  with  color.    The  long  furrows  of  the 


THE  DESERT  OF  ATAGAMA    71 

trail  wove  themselves  in  patterns  of  orange  and 
purple.  Rolling  shadows,  rich  in  their  chang- 
ing violets,  faded  slowly  and  softly  away  to  the 
left.  Gorgeous  reds  and  scarlets,  madders, 
oranges,  crimsons — every  brilliant  color  of  the 
palette — spread  in  glowing  masses,  changing 
with  each  minute  of  the  dying  day.  The  saddle- 
stiffness,  cracked  lips,  and  parched  throat,  dry 
with  the  alkaline  dust,  were  forgotten — even  the 
dismal  clank  of  the  bell-mare  slowly  toiling  in 
the  lead  mellowed  to  a  far-off  chime — and  in 
those  few  brief  moments  of  the  vanishing  day  we 
felt  the  subtle  desert  spell. 

The  shadows  grew  colder  and  merged  one  into 
another ;  the  desert  dimmed,  a  few  stars  glistened, 
and,  as  though  a  door  had  closed  behind  us,  we 
passed  into  the  night.  Twilight  is  short  in  the 
tropics.  Down  by  the  horizon  on  our  right  the 
Southern  Cross  slowly  lighted  up — four  strag- 
gling points  of  light  that  feebly  struggled  with 
the  blazing  stars  about  them.  We  closed  in  be- 
hind the  swaying  shadow  of  the  mules,  from 
which  came  the  subdued  rattle  of  packs  and 
creaking  cinches,  that  were  the  only  sounds  to 
disturb  the  dark  stillness.  It  was  but  a  little  way 
now;  in  another  hour  we  would  be  in  camp. 


72  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

Out  of  the  shadow  ahead  came  the  clash  of 
picks  and  shovels,  the  rattle  of  a  load  as  it  struck 
the  sand,  and  the  swaying  shades  of  the  mules 
divided  around  a  black  mass  stretched  on  the 
trail.  It  was  the  first  note  of  exhaustion.  For 
twelve  hours  the  mules  had  plodded  at  the  same 
steady  gait,  rested  only  by  the  halt  on  the  cliff, 
miles  back,  and  the  wonder  of  it  was  that,  with 
their  loads,  none  had  dropped  before.  As  we 
rode  up  we  could  see  against  the  faint  starlit 
ground  the  sprawling  silhouette  of  the  beast, 
lying  as  he  fell,  the  long,  expressive  ears  limp 
on  the  desert  sand.  The  arrieros  dismounted 
and  pried  him  on  his  feet  again,  and  patiently  he 
hit  the  trail.  In  the  next  half-hour  four  more 
went  down.  At  one  time  half  our  mules  were 
down,  and  we  strung  out  over  the  desert  for  two 
miles  picking  them  up. 

A  few  minutes  later  we  swung  off  to  the  right, 
stumbling  through  a  series  of  broken  ditches — 
the  remains  of  the  old  Inca  irrigation  systems 
that  ran  for  miles  back  into  the  Andes.  Then 
we  dropped  down  steep  winding  paths,  our 
shoulders  scraping  against  walls  of  sand  as  we 
turned  to  the  right  or  left  around  the  corners. 
The  mules  apparently  understood  that  a  camp 


THE   DESERT   OF  ATACAMA     73 

was  not  far  ahead,  and  seemed  fresher.  Soon 
we  rode  out  on  a  flat,  sitting  straight  in  our  sad- 
dles once  more,  with  the  hard  rattle  of  stone* 
underfoot  and  the  cool  wet  sound  of  running 
water  just  ahead.  Then  the  noiseless,  padded 
ground  of  a  corral,  and  the  mules  lay  down  and 
we  climbed  out  of  our  saddles.  It  was  the  camp 
at  last. 

A  dried  old  Indian  appeared  from  somewhere, 
and  by  the  light  of  his  tallow  dip  I  made  out 
the  time — half  past  three  in  the  morning.  We 
had  come  seventy-six  miles  without  water  or  rest. 

At  a  little  after  six  we  were  awake.  The  sun 
was  rising  above  the  cliffs  that  lined  the  valley, 
though  the  chill  of  the  night  air  still  lingered. 
Coffee  awaited  us  in  the  openwork  cane  hut  of 
the  Indian  proprietor  of  this  hacienda,  and  as 
soon  as  we  finished  it  we  would  start.  In  the 
daylight  we  could  see  that  we  were  in  a  broad 
level  valley.  Through  the  center  of  the  valley 
ran  a  brook — a  portion  of  the  same  Vitor  River 
of  the  day  before,  but  now  dwindled  to  a  tiny 
thread.  About  us  clustered  a  few  buildings  with 
low  walls  of  broken  stone  from  some  Inca  ruin. 
A  short  distance  off  was  the  mission  church  of 
the  desert,  announced  by  a  cross  of  two  twigs  tied 


74  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

with  a  strip  of  rawhide  and  surmounting  an  ex- 
crescence of  broken  stones  evidently  intended  as 
a  steeple.  We  drank  the  thick,  black  coffee,  for 
which  the  Indian  refused  both  money  and  pres- 
ents, and  at  seven  o'clock  we  started. 

It  was  all  white  sand  now,  and  everywhere  the 
same  hot,  white  glare  hedged  us  in.  There  was 
not  a  breath  of  air,  and  as  the  sun  rose  higher 
it  beat  down  with  a  constantly  growing  heat. 
Then  once  more  out  on  the  flat  desert  above. 
For  endless  miles  it  stretched,  quivering  in  the 
heated  air  of  the  morning.  Away  down  in  the 
east  the  long  line  of  the  ragged,  snow-covered 
Andes  loomed  up,  their  summits  thrust  through 
the  low  banks  of  clouds  along  the  horizon.  All 
signs  of  a  trail  had  disappeared.  The  little  fur- 
rows left  by  the  passing  pack-trains  were  filled  in 
by  the  hot  desert  winds  that  blow  always  from 
the  west.  It  is  the  unvarying  steadiness  of  these 
winds  that  causes  the  curious  crescent-shaped 
dunes  of  sand  found  on  this  desert.  There  were 
thousands  of  these  shimmering  in  the  long  dis- 
tances of  the  heated  glare,  from  little  ones  just 
blown  into  existence  and  not  six  inches  from  tip 
to  tip  up  to  great  banks  forty  feet  high  and  with 
two  hundred  feet  between  the  horns.     Super- 


THE   DESERT   OF  ATACAMA     75 

heated  puffs  of  air  blew  from  them  that  struck 
like  a  breath  from  the  first  run  of  molten  slag. 
The  heat  crept  between  your  closed  teeth  and 
dried  your  tongue.  When  you  spoke  it  was  from 
the  throat,  and  the  words  seemed  to  shrivel  in 
your  mouth. 

For  twenty  miles  we  plodded  over  the  scorch- 
ing glare,  and  then,  far  ahead,  a  small  dark  patch 
appeared.  Slowly  it  developed  and  became  a 
dull,  dusty  green — scraggly  palms  and  a  few 
peach-trees;  then  a  railroad  station  with  a  hot 
galvanized-iron  roof.     It  was  San  Jose. 

In  the  half-hour  to  train-time  our  saddles  were 
off  and  stored,  the  baggage  and  freight  separated 
and  shipped,  and  we  ourselves  stretched  com- 
fortably in  the  shade  of  the  agent's  thatched 
porch.  The  Arequipa  train  backed  in,  and  the 
agent  and  conductor  loaded  the  one  box  car,  and 
we  followed  our  outfit  in. 


CHAPTER  V 

AREQUIPA  THE  CITY  OF  CHURCHES 

THE  baking  heat  of  the  desert  boiled  in 
through  the  open  doors  of  the  freight  car, 
the  blazing  sun  beat  down  upon  the  roof, 
and,  inside,  a  thousand  essences  from  its  varie- 
gated life  simmered  and  blended.  Together 
with  some  half  dozen  of  assorted  native  passen- 
gers we  had  jammed  ourselves  in  among  a  jumble 
of  food-stuffs  and  mining  hardware  in  transit. 
The  box  car  banged  and  groaned  and  occasion- 
ally halted  on  the  desert  at  the  hail  of  some 
wayfarer  whom  we  helped  cordially  up  and 
stirred  into  the  odoriferous  oven.  Sociably  we 
rode  in  this  freight  car  up  from  the  desert  oasis 
of  San  Jose  because  this  freight  car  constituted 
the  whole  of  the  train.  Farther  on  at  Vitor 
there  was  hope  of  a  real  train. 

In  the  scant  space  left  by  the  cargo  I  had 
wedged  myself  against  a  stack  of  dried  fish  while 

76 


THE    CITY   OF   CHURCHES       77 

my  feet  reposed  easily  on  the  body  of  a  newly 
dead  pig  on  his  way  to  the  market  in  Arequipa 
joggling  in  time  to  the  uncertain  swaying  of  the 
car;  Agamemnon  fitted  his  saddle-stiff  joints  into 
a  niche  in  the  freight  and  went  peacefully  to 
sleep,  indifferent  to  the  broken  barrel  of  lime 
that  sifted  its  contents  over  him.  And  so  it  was 
that  we  pulled  in  to  Vitor,  a  town  that  hung  on 
the  edge  of  the  desert  from  which  rose  the  foot- 
hills of  the  first  Andean  range  to  the  eastward. 
Stiffly  we  climbed  down  and  out  into  the  heated, 
but  untainted  air  and  idled  in  the  station  shadow 
until  the  train  should  signify  its  readiness  to  re- 
ceive us. 

I  was  passing  through  the  patio  of  the  station 
when  I  was  briefly  conscious  of  a  rush,  a  choked 
snarl,  and  in  the  same  instant  my  whole  right 
leg  seemed  to  have  stepped  into  a  vise  clamped  to 
a  jig-saw;  the  impact  spun  me  half  around  and 
I  found  myself  helpless  in  the  grip  of  a  huge, 
flea-bitten  mongrel  that  just  lacked,  by  what  ap- 
peared to  be  a  mere  shadow  of  a  margin,  suf- 
ficient power  to  shake  me  rat  fashion.  I  judged 
that  it  was  about  eight  years  afterward  when  an 
Indian  leisurely  appeared  and  clattered  at  the 
brute.    Adroitly  it  let  go  and  disappeared  before 


78 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


I  could  get  a  sufficiently  able-bodied  rock  out  of 
the  pavement  for  I  was  unarmed,  having  packed 
my  gun  when  pre-  ^\ 
paring  to  leave  San 
Jose. 

But  it  turned  out 
to  have  been  purely 
illusion  after  all,  as 
was  apparent  on  the 
assurances  of  the 
lean  buccaneer  who 
had  the  restaurant 
privilege  and  acted 
as  station  master. 
There  was  not  a 
dog  about  the  place 
no,  senor!  I 
pointed  to  the  dor- 
sal facade  of  my 
battle-scarred  per- 
son. Caramba — 
investigation,  pron- 
tissimol  The  lean 
buccaneer  called 
and  an  Indian  re- 
sponded. It     was  ^N  AREQUIPA  CARRIER 


THE   CITY  OF   CHURCHES      79 

the  same  Indian  who  had  driven  off  the  dog. 
He  listened  to  the  buccaneer.  Then  he  replied 
at  length  and  with  gestures.  I  listened,  but  it 
was  in  Quechua  they  spoke,  a  dialect  that  sounds 
not  unlike  German  interpersed  with  an  occa- 
sional vocal  imitation  of  a  brass  band.  The 
buccaneer  again  turned  to  me: 

"  Senor,  it  is  as  I  said.  There  is  no  dog, — 
there  has  been  no  dog, — I  have  no  dog — it  is  a 
very  great  pity, — I  sympathize!" 

It  revealed  to  me  a  power  of  imagination  I  had 
not  suspected  myself  of  possessing,  though  Aga- 
memnon who  was  pinning  up  the  rents  and  count- 
ing the  punctures  still  regarded  it  as  an  actual 
occurence. 

The  blistering  hours  on  the  trail  across  the 
desert  had  left  us  as  parched  as  a  dried  sponge, 
crackly  and  dusty  and  with  brittle,  peeling  skins 
ravenous  for  moisture.  Outside  the  newly  made- 
up  train  on  either  side  straggled  a  collection  of 
grimy,  sand-blown  Indians — mainly  women — 
peddling  queer,  uncertain  foods  from  earthen 
pots  or  battered  tin  cans  that  were  in  great  de- 
mand among  the  sophisticated  natives  while,  on 
a  higher  plane  of  dignity,  a  fat,  placid  Cholo 
sent  the  first  native  urchin  on  whom  his  eye  fell 


8o  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

into  the  station  presently  to  deliver  to  you  a  bot- 
tle of  unripe,  bilious  beer  as  warm  as  the  hot 
shadow  in  which  it  had  been  kept.  Its  color, 
foam,  and  the  characteristic  shape  of  the  bottles 
were  means  of  identification,  but,  with  the  eyes 
closed,  it  did  not  differ  materially  from  catnip 
tea  or  any  of  the  old  home  remedy  stand-bys. 
And  never  did  an  orange  look  more  nobly  lusci- 
ous, for  the  round,  unripe,  green  skin  of  the 
native  product  enfolds  a  heart  of  nectar. 

From  Vitor  on  we  wound  through  twisting 
gorges  or  steep  valleys,  barren  of  all  save  cactus 
and  the  desert  shale  and  boulders.  Steadily  the 
train  climbed.  Always  on  one  side  or  the  other 
were  the  traces  of  the  old  Inca  empire  and  its 
industrious  dominion ;  here  a  fragmentary  stretch 
of  road  and  a  ruined  gateway,  now  and  again  the 
almost  obliterated  ruins  of  some  old  town  or  vil- 
lage, but  always,  running  along  the  sides  of  the 
steep  hills  or  through  the  valleys,  the  dusty  re- 
mains of  a  tremendous  system  of  irrigation 
ditches.  Where  once  has  been  a  busy  land,  soft 
with  the  green  of  growing  things,  there  are  the 
cactus  and  the  badger  and  the  occasional  baked- 
mud  hut  of  an  Indian  wringing  a  dull  living 
from  the  desert,  Heaven  knows  how,  where  his 


m  ' 

^H 

H 

•*    **              '       -  *»■          '' 

H 

^KaW 

^^B^^^^^^m^^^^^^t-V^ffli^BJ^^Bi 

^^B 

I^Hfl^H 

IwNk 

SI 

1  ^^^^^^^^^^|h^ 

^^^^ 

.-..'•'     if         tir- 

^B^. ,  :           .^..v  ^JB#^"^-^  ^jB^Bt^l^^ 

■ 

• 

9 

In  Arequipa  the  City  of  Churches 


» 


THE    CITY   OF   CHURCHES       8ii 

ancestors  once  farmed  and  throve  in  multitudes. 

The  contrast  stirs  the  dullest  fancy.  And  on 
the  side  of  the  spoilers  for  their  gains?  Only 
the  dessicated  remains  of  a  treacherous  old  pirate 
that  may  be  viewed — for  a  very  moderate  tip — 
through  the  side  of  a  marble  aquarium  back  in 
Lima  as  a  cathedral  curio  and,  in  Europe,  an 
asthmatic  and  toothless  Spain  drained  to  decrepi- 
tude by  her  own  remorseless  greed  and  predace- 
ous  piety. 

In  the  long  rays  of  the  sunset  the  train  rolled 
across  the  level  stretches  of  the  high  valley  in 
which  lies  the  city  of  Arequipa.  The  low,  flat 
houses — more  or  less  earthquake  proof — and  the 
red  tile  roofs  were  radiant  in  the  mellow  glow. 
Beyond  rose  the  dull,  volcanic  slopes  of  Misti  in 
an  immense  cone,  while  best  of  all,  in  the  one 
story  hotel  of  rambling  patios  in  that  city  of 
earthquakes  we  were  once  more  able  to  collect 
sufficient  water  at  one  time  to  accomplish  a  bath. 
In  Arequipa  the  first  train  stops  exhausted; 
manana,  or  at  the  worst  only  a  few  days  later, 
a  second  train  leaves  to  climb  the  first  high  pass 
and  leave  its  passengers  on  the  shores  of  Lake 
Titicaca. 

Throughout  the  city  there  is  scarcely  a  build- 


82  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

ing  that  cannot  show  patched  cracks  or  gaping 
cornices  that  are  the  scars  of  earthquakes ;  here 
and  there  a  heap  of  rock  and  plaster  or  fragmen- 
tary walls  abandoned  to  the  Indian  beggars  mark 
the  years  of  great  temblors.  Rarely  does  a  pri- 
vate house  attempt  a  second  story  and  the  marvel 
is  how  the  churches  or  the  cathedral,  with  their 
high  walls  and  towers,  have  been  able  to  survive 
at  all !  Though  often  cracked  and  battered,  yet 
in  some  way  they  have  weathered  the  subter- 
ranean gales. 

And  what  a  city  for  churches!  On  every 
street,  on  all  but  every  turn,  there  rises  an  ec- 
clesiastical edifice  with  its  grim  walls  of  faded, 
peeling  kalsomine  and  its  porticos,  perhaps  orna- 
mented with  odd  stone  carvings  that  preserve  a 
strong  Indian  flavor  in  spite  of  the  old  monkish 
guidance.  Whole  blocks  in  the  heart  of  the  city 
are  bounded  by  enormous  walls  enclosing  the 
sacred  precincts  of  a  convent  or  monastery.  I 
was  informed  that  out  of  every  twelve  inhabi- 
tants, men,  women,  and  children,  one  was  in  some 
of  the  many  orders  behind  the  high  walls.  Each 
day  in  some  part  of  the  city  is  a  fiesta  in  honor  of 
some  particular  saint  who  is  heralded  and  hon- 
ored by  a  vast  popping  of  firecrackers,  squibs. 


THE   CITY   OF   CHURCHES       83 


HARDILY    A    DAY    WITHOUT    ITS    SAINTS    FIESTA. 

and  rockets  and  a  grand  procession  through  the 
neighborhood.  Often  several  saints'  fiestas  fall 
on  the  same  day  and  from  all  directions  come  the 
rattle  of  firecrackers  and  the  plop  of  the  daylight 
bombs  or  rockets  and  any  casual  stroll  will  bring 
one  against  a  procession  heavy  with  the  smoke 
of  incense  or  uncanny  with  the  thin,  wailing 
chanting  of  the  celebrants. 

The  whole  city  centers  around  an  extraordi- 
narily large  central  plaza  on  one  side  of  which  is 
the  ancient  cathedral  with  its  tiers  of  bells  in  the 
bell  tower  still  lashed  to  the  massive  beams  by 


84  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

rawhide  thongs.  The  remaining  three  sides  are 
business  arcades  of  small  shops,  the  pastries,  and 
cafes;  the  bullet  chipped  arches  still  confirming 
the  earnestness  with  which  many  a  civil  election 
has  been  contested  between  the  liberal  and  the 
clerical  elements  after  the  returns  were  counted 
— or,  quite  as  often,  during  that  process. 

The  chief  industry  is  in  a  few  machine  shops 
and  central  supply  houses  for  the  mines  of  the  in- 
terior. Outside  of  this  there  is  nothing.  A  few 
small  shops  with  the  cheapest  and  shabbiest  of 
stocks  cluster  around  the  plaza;  on  Sunday  that 
same  plaza  is  scantily  filled  with  the  select  of 
Arequipa  while  the  stocky  police  keep  it  cleared 
of  the  tattered  urchins  and  Indians  of  the  week- 
days. There  is  the  dull,  oppressive  sense  of 
wretched  poverty  or  genteel  destitution.  It  is  in 
the  sharpest  contrast  with  the  general  run  of 
other  and  typical  Latin  cities;  the  whole  city 
seems  to  have  become  encysted  in  a  hopeless 
poverty  in  which  any  form  of  local  energy  is 
permitted  to  find  expression  only  in  ecclesiasti- 
cal fireworks  or  mystical  parades  of  wailing  and 
incense. 

The  start  from  Arequipa  up  to  Lake  Titicaca 
is  made  in  the  early  morning.     The  huge  cone 


THE    CITY   OF    CHURCHES       85 


AN   ANDEAN   TOURING   CAR 


of  Misti — looking  for  all  the  world  like  a  vast 
slag  dump — stands  forth  with  telescopic  detail 
in  the  high,  rare  air  mellowed  in  the  cool  morn- 
ing sun.  Prickling  and  glistening  on  the  even 
slopes  or  in  the  purple  shadows,  the  frost  still 
clings  like  a  lichen  to  the  barren  rocks  and  there 
is  a  thin  touch  of  briskness  in  the  air  like  the 
taste  of  fall  on  a  September  morning  back  home. 
Down  at  the  station  the  departure  of  the  train 
is  in  the  nature  of  an  event  like  the  sailing  of  a 
steamer.     Already  the  train — one  first-class  and 


86  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

two  second-class  coaches — is  filled,  aisles  and 
seats,  with  a  shuffling  crowd  already  in  the  ec- 
stacy  of  a  noisy  and  mournful,  but  interminable 
leave  taking.  Their  view  of  the  hazards  of  a 
journey  by  rail  may  not  be  so  far  out  of  the  way 
for  on  the  steep  grades  of  these  Andean  roads  a 
train  has  been  known  to  break  in  half  and  go 
scuttling  back  down  hill  until  the  hand-brakes 
take  effect;  also,  and  later,  on  the  ancient  engine 
I  observed  with  interest  the  native  engineer, 
screw  down  his  throttle  and  then,  in  starting, 
bang  it  open  with  a  monkey  wrench. 

Presently,  as  the  hour  of  departure  drew  near, 
the  conductor  appeared  and  began  sorting  out 
the  passengers.  Rebozo-muffiGd  ladies  and 
Peruvian  gentlemen  who  failed  to  show  tickets 
and  who  had  been  picnicking  in  the  seats  burst 
into  one  final  explosion  of  embracings  and  good- 
byes before  descending  to  the  tracks  where  they 
took  up  a  position  alongside  the  car  windows. 
The  second-class  were  not  admitted  to  their  hard 
benches  except  on  proof  of  actually  possessing 
a  ticket,  but  the  stubby  trainmen  had  their  hands 
full  in  keeping  the  car  door  clear  for  they  were 
continually  choked  with  Cholo  or  Indian  groups 
committing  last  messages   to   memory.     Their 


THE    CITY   OF   CHURCHES       87 

windows  were  jammed  with  heads  and  clawing 
arms  exchanging  or  accepting  dripping  foods 
wrapped  in  platano  leaves,  bottles  of  checha,  or 
earthen  pots  containing  Heaven  knows  what. 

At  last  the  whistle  screamed  from  the  engine, 
a  bell  tinkled,  and  the  train  moved  out  in  state  to 
the  demonstrations  of  the  populace.  The  car 
was  but  moderately  filled;  a  couple  of  padres 
from  Ecuador — one  a  political  refugee — a  ton- 
sured monk,  a  couple  of  black-robed  nuns,  and 
three  engineers,  together  with  an  assortment  of 
Peruvians — the  women  in  the  shrouding,  tightly 
drawn  rebozo  of  funeral  black  against  which  the 
heavy  face-powdering  showed  in  ghastly  con- 
trast— and  a  couple  of  small  children  who  turned 
up  at  intervals  from  under  the  seats,  grimed  with 
train  cinders  and  ecstatically  sticky  with  chan- 
caca,  a  raw  sugar  sort  of  candy.  And  in  every 
vacant  seat  was  baggage,  native,  hairy  rawhide 
boxes  shapeless  from  the  many  pack-mule  lash- 
ings, paper  bags,  and  pasteboard  hat  boxes  and 
bandanna  bundles  and  somewhere  in  the  collec- 
tion each  Peruvian  seemed  to  be  able  to  draw 
on  an  inexhaustible  supply  of  the  Arequipa 
brewed,  bilious,  green  beer. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THROUGH  THE  INCA  COUNTRY 

SLOWLY  at  first  we  rose,  skirting  the  great 
foothills  or  gently  ascending  valleys  and  al- 
ways crossing  some  dismantled  relic  of  the 
dead  Inca  empire.  Then  we  plunged  boldly 
into  the  mountain  chain  teetering  over  spidery 
bridges  across  gorges  whose  bottom  was  a  ribbon 
of  foam  or  where  the  rails  followed  a  winding 
shelf  cut  in  the  face  of  the  mountain,  where  an 
empty  beer  bottle  flung  from  the  car  window 
broke  on  the  tracks  below  over  which  the  train 
had  been  crawling  a  quarter  of  an  hour  before. 
With  the  increasing  altitude — the  summit  of  the 
pass  was  still  ahead  and  something  over  fifteen 
thousand  feet  above  sea  level — the  soroche, 
mountain  sickness,  began  to  be  manifest  in  the 
car  in  deathly,  nauseating  dizziness  until  it 
closely  resembled  the  woebegone  cabin  of  a  sight- 
seeing steamer  at  a  yacht  race. 

88 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY      89 

The  enginers  had  been  discussing  the  traces 
of  the  old  Inca  works  with  special  reference  to 
their  irrigation  systems,  of  which  there  was  gen- 
erally a  ruin  visible  out  of  one  window  or  the 
other.  Special  emphasis  had  been  laid  on  the 
total  lack  of  survival  of  any  instruments  or 
methods  by  which  this  hydraulic  engineering 
had  been  calculated  or  performed.  There  is  a 
trace  of  one  irrigation  ditch  something  like  one 
hundred  and  twenty-five  miles  in  length — a  set  of 
levels  for  such  a  project  even  to-day  would  be  a 
matter  for  nice  calculation.  The  Incas  simply 
went  ahead  and  did  it,  some  way.  Their  en- 
gineering had  been  turned  over  and  over  and 
compared  with  the  great  engineering  works  of 
antiquity. 

"  Cut  and  try,"  said  one  engineer  in  conclu- 
sion; "  that  was  the  way  these  old  Inca  people 
made  their  irrigation  systems.  Put  a  gang  of 
Indians  to  digging  a  ditch  from  where  the  water 
supply  was  to  come ;  then  let  in  the  water  as  they 
dug — in  a  little  ditch — and  dig  deeper  or  dike 
it  up  to  the  water  level  as  it  showed  in  the  trench. 
When  they  had  that  little  ditch  finished  there 
was  their  level ;  all  they  had  to  do  was  to  dig  it  as 
big  and  deep  and  wide  as  they  wanted." 


90  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

It  looked  reasonable;  there  was  no  dissent. 
We  swung  around  a  curve  and  a  vista  opened  out 
of  a  ragged  valley,  broken  by  gorges  and  canons 
with  sheer  walls  of  soft  rock. 

One  of  the  other  engineers  chuckled.  "  Look 
at  that!"  He  pointed  up  the  valley  and  his 
finger  followed  one  of  the  canons.  "  How  did 
they  cut  and  try  on  that  proposition?  " 

There,  for  as  far  as  the  eye  could  follow  the 
turnings  of  the  canon  way  was  the  line  of  a  ditch, 
an  aqueduct,  that  hung  some  twenty  to  fifty  feet 
below  the  edge  of  the  cliff.  It  had  been  cut  into 
the  wall  of  rock,  leaving  a  lip  along  the  outer 
edge  to  hold  in  the  current  Here  and  there, 
where  the  ragged  trace  of  the  canon  made  pro- 
jecting, buttressing  angles,  the  aqueduct  had  been 
driven  as  a  short-cut  tunnel  straight  through. 
Here  and  there  great  sections  of  the  canon  walls 
had  fallen,  while  occasionally  it  appeared  as 
though  the  outer  lip  had  been  destroyed  by  man- 
made  efforts — one  of  the  old  Spanish  methods  of 
hurrying  up  a  little  ready  tribute — but  never  had 
there  been  a  possibility  of  using  any  "  cut  and 
try  "  method  of  its  construction. 

"  Well,"  remarked  the  first,  "  there  goes  that 
theory — and  it  isn't  original  with  me  either^ — fon 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY     91 

I  reckon  they  had  to  run  that  level  first  and  chalk 
it  up  on  the  rock  to  cut  by  in  some  kind  of  a 
way.'* 

It  is  a  trifle  staggering,  when  you  think  of  it, 
that  a  nation  that  was  able  to  solve  engineering 
difficulties  like  these,  to  turn  an  arid  desert  into 
a  teeming  farm  and  to  organize  and  administer 
a  vast  empire,  should  have  been  wantonly  de- 
stroyed all  for  the  lack  of  a  little  knowledge  of 
the  combination  of  saltpetre,  sulphur,  and  char- 
coal. And  the  wretched  waste!  Think  of  that 
church-benisoned  riffraff  of  the  medieval 
slums,  recognizing  only  the  greed  for  raw  gold, 
wasting  a  whole  people  in  torture  to  satisfy  the 
rapacious  gluttony  of  a  Spanish  court. 

Sometimes  the  train  crawled  along  no  faster 
than  a  bare  walk,  so  steep  were  the  grades  and 
sharp  the  turns.  There  was  nothing  of  the  scenic 
splendor  such  as  one  may  get  in  the  railroads 
among  the  Alps  of  Switzerland  and  where,  as 
one  climbs,  one  may  look  down  and  back  into  the 
green  landscape  of  a  panorama.  The  scale  was 
too  great,  the  sense  of  proportion  and  distance 
was  subdued;  a  stretch  great  enough  for  a  Swiss 
panorama  was  one  vast  gorge  twisting  its  way 
among  the  vaster  masses  of  the  Andes.     The 


92  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

crest  of  the  pass  itself  was  higher  than  Mount 
Rainier. 

Sometimes  the  train  passed  over  high  plateaus 
where  occasionally  in  the  distance  could  be  seen 
the  low  house  of  some  hacienda  or  the  grouped 
huts  of  Indians  while  beyond  in  the  great  dis- 
tance the  plain  was  rimmed  with  a  jagged  line 
of  snow-capped  peaks.  The  winds  swept  across 
the  level  stretches,  raising  an  assortment  of  sand- 
spouts and  dusty  cyclones.  They  were  of  all 
sizes,  from  tiny  remolinos  that  died  in  a  few 
puffs  to  towering  whirlwinds  that  spiraled  fif- 
teen hundred  feet  in  the  air  with  a  base  of  fifty 
feet  that  juggled  boulders  in  its  vortex  like  so 
many  cork  chips.  They  would  move  leisurely 
for  a  short  space  and  then  dart  like  a  flash  in  an 
erratic  path.  Sometimes  fifteen  or  twenty  of 
these  would  be  in  sight  at  the  same  time.  Herds 
of  llamas  grazed  over  the  plain,  sometimes  a 
flock  of  sheep  or  an  occasional  horse,  each  with 
a  wary  eye  on  the  whirlwinds ;  if  one  approached 
too  near  they  galloped  oflF.  Not  infrequently  a 
herd  of  guanacos  would  gallop  off  at  the  ap- 
proach of  the  train  or  could  be  seen  grazing  in 
the  distance. 

From  beyond  the  high  plain  the  grades  les- 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY     93 

sened  and  the  train  rolled  along  at  a  fine  speed — 
for  South  America.  At  rare  intervals  there  was 
a  station  and  a  short  stop,  usually  the  lonely  out- 
post of  some  mining  company.  Then  the  grades 
began  to  slope  our  way  and  in  place  of  the  dry 
bunch  grass  there  were  rolling  hills  and  gentle 
valleys  of  soft  green  grass.  Little  lakes  nestled 
in  the  hills,  their  cold  waters  black  with  wild- 
fowl that  scarcely  fluttered  up  as  the  train  shot 
by.  We  were  making  the  slight  drop  down  to 
that  vast  inter-Andean  plateau  that  stretches 
from  Bolivia  on  up  into  Ecuador. 

A  cold  winter  sunset  sank  beyond  the  cold 
purple  of  the  western  peaks ;  a  couple  of  feeble, 
smoking  and  smelling  oil  lamps  irritated  the 
darkness  and  added  their  fragrance  to  the  close 
atmosphere — for  in  the  bitter  winds  and  biting 
cold  of  the  high  altitude  the  windows  had  long 
since  been  closed. 

Juliaca  was  reached,  a  junction  by  which  one 
may  connect  for  Cuzco,  the  old  Inca  capital.  It 
showed  in  the  blackness  as  a  few  dingy  lights. 
Here  the  car  emptied  itself  of  all  but  half  a 
dozen  bound  for  Bolivia  across  the  lake.  Once 
again  we  wheezed  under  way  and  presently  with 
a  grand  celebration  from  the  engine's  whistle 


94  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

the  train  pulled  slowly  into  the  train  yards  of 
the  terminal  at  Puno  and  as  we  climbed  out 
there  came  the  light,  musical  splash  of  fresh- 
water surf  and  the  unmistakable  smell  of  water. 
Dimly  under  the  starlight  there  loomed  the  form 
of  a  boat  and  the  dim  reflecting  surface  of  the 
water  was  picked  out  by  the  dark  patches  of  the 
native  Indian  craft.  It  was  the  great  Lake  Titi- 
caca. 

Down  at  the  end  of  the  stone  dock  lay  the 
Yavari  a  slim,  patched  boat,  twice  lengthened, 
whose  hull  and  engines  had  been  packed  piece- 
meal on  the  backs  of  burros,  llamas,  and  mules 
over  the  Andes  to  the  Titicaca  shores  over  fifty 
years  ago.  It  had  taken  a  year  to  do  it.  It  was 
the  first  steamer  on  the  lake  and  wonderful  was 
the  amazement  of  the  native  population  as  they 
beheld  this  veritable  monster  of  the  seas — some 
sixty  feet  in  length — shoot  mysteriously  through 
the  water  at  the  prodigious  speed  of  some  seven 
miles  an  hour. 

Forward,  on  either  side,  was  an  array  of  tiny 
staterooms,  each  about  the  size  of  a  wardrobe 
into  which  penetrated  a  most  grateful  warmth 
from  the  boilers.  A  scrap  of  tallow  candle 
threw  the  suspicious  looking  bunks  into  shadow 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY     95 

and  it  was  not  long  before  I  was  in  one  under 
my  own  blankets.  From  the  little  cabin  aft 
came  the  clatter  of  the  native  travelers  over  a 
late  lunch  served  by  a  bare-legged  Quechua 
sailor;  it  was  in  the  main  some  kind  of  a  hash 
preparation  loaded  with  aji,  a  venomous  pepper 
that  will  penetrate  the  stoutest  stomach.  I  had 
tried  it  and  having  been  both  warned  and  pun- 
ished in  the  same  mouthful,  I  was  glad  to  seek 
the  wardrobe  bunk  to  weep  it  out  of  my  system 
in  cramped  solitude. 

In  the  first  streaks  of  dawn  the  Yavari  backed 
out  from  the  long  dock  and  swung  out  upon  the 
crystal-clear,  blue  waters  of  Lake  Titicaca.  On 
the  other  side  of  the  dock  at  a  disabled  angle 
and  under  repairs  lay  the  more  pretentious 
steamer  Coya — literally  the  Inca  Queen — with 
diminutive  bridge  and  chart-house  and  all  the 
trappings  of  a  deep  sea  liner  shrunk  and  crowded 
into  small  compass.  Varieties  of  water  fowl 
dotted  the  water's  edge  in  large  flocks  busily  at 
breakfast  and  almost  indifferent  to  the  occasional 
straw  or  rather  reed  canoe  of  the  Indians. 

All  day  the  Yavari  skirted  a  coast  that  rolled 
back  in  long  hills  or  at  times  came  down  to  the 
lake  in  a  steep  bluff.     Very  slowly  the  lake  is  re- 


96  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

ceding.  Old  Inca  towns  once  evidently  on  the 
shore  line  are  back  from  the  water;  since  Piz- 
arro's  time  the  distance  is  a  matter  of  miles.  In 
the  little  party  on  the  boat  the  old  tales  of  the 
Inca  gold  and  Atahualpa's  tribute  became  natur- 
ally a  leading  topic.  The  country  from  the 
highlands  of  Colombia  down  to  Chile  are  filled 
with  legends  of  secreted  treasure  and  lost  mines 
or  cacheSjfor  Pizarro  did  not  wait  for  Atahualpa 
to  pay  his  ransom — he  burned  him  at  the  stake 
when  he  realized  that  the  Inca  emperor  could  ac- 
tually get  together  a  council  chamber  packed  to 
the  ceiling  with  raw  gold. 

There  were  scores  of  llama  trains  coming 
down  the  Andes  from  the  uttermost  parts  of  the 
empire,  a  veritable  flood  of  gold  was  on  its  way 
to  secure  the  release  of  the  sacred  Inca  chief. 
It  never  arrived  and  somewhere  up  and  down 
some  three  thousand  miles  of  Andes  there  are 
legends  galore  of  Inca  tribute  treasure  concealed 
by  the  Indians  on  the  burning  of  their  king. 
There  are  legends  of  monkish  parchment  maps 
left  by  early  missionaries  that  locate  rediscover- 
ies with  apparent  exactness  up  to  certain  points, 
of  mines  relocated  by  accident;  in  one  case,  a 
drunken  Scotch  donkey-engine  driver  took  up 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY     97 

and  finally  married  a  wretched  Aymara  mine- 
woman,  a  half-human  creature;  she  finally  re- 
vealed to  him  the  location  of  one  of  the  old  con- 
cealed mines  and  the  two  worked  it  together. 
As  the  story  runs,  they  acquired  fabulous  wealth, 
he  longed  for  Scotland  and  went  back  taking 
her  with  him  and  importing  for  her  use  the 
chuno  and  chalona  that  was  her  only  food.  He 
played  fair.  Finally  he  died  there  and  his 
widow  managed  to  get  back  to  her  own  moun- 
tains where  she  was  finally  poisoned  for  her 
money  or  her  secret. 

Legend  also  has  it  that  around  the  city  of 
Cuzco — the  seat  of  the  Incas — there  was  a  great 
golden  chain  and  that  this,  upon  the  approach  of 
Pizarro,  was  dropped  into  Titicaca.  It  is  al- 
ways a  steamer  discussion  as  to  how  soon  the  lake 
will  have  receded  enough  to  make  its  discoverey 
a  matter  of  possibility.  At  the  possible  place 
where  it  was  dropped  in  the  engineer  of  the 
Coya  holds  that  the  lake  has  receded  some  six 
miles  since  the  conquest. 

There  is  also  the  legend  of  the  immense  treas- 
ure train  coming  down  in  sections  from  what  is 
now  Colombia  and  Ecuador  which  was  on  the 
mountain  trails  at  the  time  of  Atahualpa's  death ; 


98  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

evidence  is  said  to  exist  of  the  despatch  of  this 
gold  which  would  have  more  than  completed  the 
ransom.  It  never  arrived,  it  was  never  heard  of 
again  after  the  burning  at  the  stake,  but  it  is  a 
common  belief  to-day  that  there  are  many  In- 
dians to  whom  these  matters  are  tribal  secrets. 
There  are  common  tales  of  odd  Indians,  neither 
Quechua  nor  Aymara,  those  being  the  two  great 
Indian  divisions,  suddenly  appearing  from  time 
to  time  and  taking  part  in  some  Indian  fiesta  of 
peculiar  importance,  although  evidently  all  the 
fiestas  now  have  been  given  an  ecclesiastical  sig- 
nificance— and  then  as  completely  disappearing. 
There  are  rumors  of  tribes  and  even  cities  buried 
in  the  eastern  slopes  of  the  Andes  from  which 
these  irregular  excursions  come. 

Skirting  the  shore  until  the  late  afternoon,  the 
Yavari  struck  out  into  the  ocean  horizon  that 
stretched  away  in  the  blue  distance,  until  wc 
raised  the  Island  of  the  Sun  and  the  Island  of 
the  Moon.  The  former  Is  reputed  to  have  been 
the  summer  residence  of  the  Incas  and  there  still 
remain  the  ruins  of  palaces  together  with  a  great 
basin  or  reservoir  hewn  from  the  solid  rock  and 
traditionally  known  as  the  Inca's  bath  tub.  To 
the  other  island  is  ascribed  the  home  of  the  wives 


THROUGH  THE  INC  A  COUNTRY     99 

and  concubines  of  the  Incas,  or  perhaps  a  train- 
ing school  where  they  were  domiciled  until,  like 
an  army  reserve,  they  were  called  to  the  colors. 

From  each  of  them  the  Yavari  took  on  a  little 
freight,  a  few  sacks  of  cehada,  barley,  and  chuno, 
the  little,  dried  up,  original,  native  American 
potato,  not  much  larger  than  a  nutmeg.  The 
cargo  was  on  board  a  heavy,  sluggish  reed  boat, 
a  big  affair  in  which  burros  and  even  bullocks 
are  carried  to  or  from  these  lake  islands — of 
which  there  are  many  scattered  here  and  there 
— and  the  mainland. 

All  the  western  slopes  of  the  Andes  are  tree- 
less, the  high  plains  are  treeless,  and  the  few 
poles  that  are  used  in  the  thatched  roofs  of  the 
Indian  huts  are  dragged  out  from  the  montana, 
as  the  interior  over  the  final  Andean  passes  is 
called.  These  skinny  little  poles  are  regular 
articles  of  trade.  Therefore,  the  Lake  Titicaca 
Indian  has  evolved  his  reed  canoe  and  boat. 

The  reed,  which  grows  along  the  shores  of 
the  lake,  is  bound  in  round  bundles  tapering  at 
both  ends;  these  bundles  in  turn  are  lashed 
together  to  form  the  canoes,  from  the  little 
bundles  to  the  larger  boats  that  can  carry 
freight.     Sometimes  a  mat  sail,  also  from  these 


100  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

same  reeds,  is  hoisted  on  a  couple  of  poles  lashed 
together  at  the  apex  and  at  the  base  braced 
against  the  inside  of  the  clumsy  craft.  The 
steering  is  done  with  an  oar  made  from  a  pole 
and  a  board,  while  similar  oars  are  used  by  the 
crew  who  drive  a  wooden  pin  for  an  oarlock  at 
any  convenient  spot  along  the  reed-bundle 
gunwale.  In  this  kind  of  an  outfit  they  put  out 
on  the  lake  fishing  for  the  little  fish  that  alone 
seem  to  have  survived  in  the  cold  waters,  or 
shuffling  across  the  waves  from  the  coast  to  one 
little  sugar-loaf  island  after  another  in  their 
native  trade.  In  Pizarro's  day  it  was  probably 
the  same — costume,  craft,  and  barter. 

One  more  night  in  the  cramped  wardrobe  of 
the  Yavari — during  which  my  solution  of  al- 
cohol and  salicylic  acid  procured  in  flea-bitten 
Lima — against  other  similar  emergencies — did 
valiant  service,  and  in  the  morning  we  awoke  to 
the  clatter  of  the  Indian  mate  and  his  Quechua 
crew  as  they  made  the  little  steamer  fast  to  the 
dock  at  Guaqui.  From  here  a  railroad  runs 
over  a  continuation  of  the  level  high  plain  and 
past  the  ruins  of  Tiajuanaca  to  the  edge  of  the 
plateau  above  La  Paz.  The  valley  of  La  Paz 
is  a  vast  crack  torn  in  the  level  plain  as  by  some 


In  Pizarro's  Day  It  Was  Probably  the  Same— Costume,  Crafty 

and  Barter 


TJHROUGH  THE  INCA  COUNTRY    Vol 

primeval  cataclysmic  blast;  on  the  farther  side 
there  is  the  tremendous  peak  of  Illomani  with  a 
cape  of  perpetual  snow  far  down  its  grim 
flanks;  far  off  in  the  ragged  valley  and  some 
two  thousand  feet  below  the  railroad  terminal  is 
the  capital  of  Bolivia,  La  Paz.  Once  no  trolley 
wound  its  way  down  the  steep  sides,  and  in  those 
days  there  still  gathered  at  the  station  every 
Deadwood  and  express  coach  that  had  ever 
existed  at  the  north.  A  crew  of  runners  would 
meet  the  train,  pile  all  the  freight  and  pas- 
sengers that  were  possible  inside,  lash  the  rest 
on  the  roof,  and  then  with  their  four  or  six 
horse  teams — never  an  animal  free  from  a  col- 
lar gall — on  a  dead  run  race  for  a  place  at  the 
edge  of  the  mesa  in  order  to  be  the  first  on  the 
winding  trail  that  led  downward  to  the  city. 
Whips  cracking,  horses  on  the  jump,  coaches 
swinging  and  banging,  here  a  hairy  rawhide 
trunk  goes  off,  and  there  an  Indian  hotel  mozo 
is  snapped  straight  out  in  the  rush  as  he  tries  to 
crawl  up  on  the  baggage  rack  behind ;  and  then 
the  dropping  trail  in  a  whirl  of  dust  over  a  road 
scarcely  better  than  a  dry  creek  bottom  until,  at 
last,  over  the  rough  cobbles  of  La  Paz  itself,  to 
pull  up  at  the  door  of  the  hotel  with  the  rough 


'^'^'^iok'^^^M  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

horses  in  a  lather  and  with  white  eyes  and  heav- 
ing sides.  That  was  the  way  it  was  once.  Now 
it  is  different;  you  can  ride  down  sedately  in  a 
trolley  car  and  walk  into  the  hotel  with  never  a 
hair  turned. 


CHAPTER  VII 

OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN 

HERE  in  La  Paz  were  completed  the  final 
arrangements  for  reaching  the  interior; 
this  was  the  last  of  the  easy  traveling, 
from  now  on  it  would  be  by  pack  train  and 
saddle,  raft  and  canoe,  and  to  gather  them  we 
advanced  from  one  interior  town  to  another  as 
best  we  might.  It  was  the  third  and  last  of  the 
Andean  series  that  was  to  be  crossed,  and  it  was 
also  the  highest  and  hardest.  Daily  we  haggled 
with  arrieros  over  pack  mules  or  rode  to  their 
corrals  in  the  precipitous  suburbs  of  the  city  and 
between  times  there  were  the  odds  and  ends  of 
a  big  outfit  to  be  filled  in  and  the  commissary  to 
be  stocked.  It  was  the  last  place  where  the  little 
things  of  civilization  could  be  procured,  for 
there  was  but  one  more  real  settlement,  Sorata 
over  the  first  pass,  that  could  be  counted  upon 
for  anything  that  had  been  overlooked.  And 
then  one  day  it  appeared  as  though  we  were 

complete. 

103 


I04  JCROSS   THE  ANDES 


HAGGI^KD    WITH    ARRIEROS    OV^R   PACK    MULKS. 

The  arriero  came  around  and  weighed  the 
cargo  and  divided  it  in  rawhide  nets,  equally 
balanced,  according  to  each  individual  mule's 
capacity  and  then  even  before  daybreak  on  the 
following  morning  we  were  off. 

It  seemed  like  midnight.  The  dead,  still 
blackness  of  the  night,  with  the  lighter  crevice 
of  gloom  that  marked  the  dividing-line  between 
the  curtains  at  the  window  gave  no  indication 
of  dawn,  and  only  the  echo  of  the  little  tin 
alarm-clock,  with  its  hands  irritatingly  point- 
ing to  the  hour  of  necessity,  indicated  that  at 


OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    105 

last  the  time  was  at  hand  for  the  actual  entry 
into  the  vague  interior  of  South  America.  A 
thin  tallow  candle  glimmered  in  the  high-ceil- 
inged  room  and  illumed  flickering  patches  be- 
tween the  areas  of  cold,  uncertain  darkness,  and 
by  its  light  I  scrambled  into  breeches,  puttees, 
and  spurs,  and  buckled  my  gun  under  my  heavy, 
wool-lined  jacket.  Down  in  the  patio  I  could 
hear  an  Aymara  scuffling  about  in  his  rawhide 
sandals,  and  as  I  stepped  out  on  the  balcony 
above  the  patio,  a  thin  drift  of  acrid  smoke 
floated  up  from  where  he  was  cooking  our  tin 
of  coffee  over  a  clay  fire-pot  with  llama  dung 
for  fuel. 

Below  my  window,  up  from  the  narrow 
street  there  came  the  shuffling  noises  of  the  pack- 
train — the  creak  of  rawhide  cinches,  the  thud 
and  strain  of  the  packs  as  they  came  in  restless 
collision  and  now  and  again  the  "  Hola!  hola! " 
or  "Huish!"  of  an  arriero  or  more  often  the 
-long-drawn  hiss  of  a  rawhide  thong.  Then  the 
pack-train  lengthened  in  file,  and  the  noise 
died  away  up  the  crooked,  narrow  street.  The 
few  final  necessities  of  the  trail  I  jammed  in  my 
saddle-bag  as  the  last  mule  was  packed;  then 
had  a  cup  of  coffee,  steaming  hot,  although  only 


io6  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

comfortably  warm  to  the  taste  from  the  low- 
boiling  point  of  the  high  altitude,  and  we 
climbed  into  the  saddle  and  were  off. 

The  city  of  La  Paz  was  still  in  darkness,  but 
above  the  rim  of  the  great  crack  in  the  depths 
of  which  it  rests  there  was  a  suggestion  of  a 
silver  haze  that  dimmed  the  stars.  The 
streets  were  deserted  except  for  an  occasional 
scavenger  pig  grunting  restlessly  on  its  way. 
Sometimes  a  little  Bolivian  policeman,  in  heavy 
coat  and  cape,  and  muffled  to  the  eyes  in  a 
woolen  tippet,  would  peer  sleepily  from  the 
shelter  of  a  great  Spanish  doorway,  and  then, 
observing  our  solemn  respectability,  sink  back 
into  the  comfortable  shadow.  By  the  time  we 
had  rejoined  the  main  body  of  the  pack-train 
we  were  in  the  shabbier  outskirts  of  La  Paz, 
where  the  Aymaras  and  the  Cholos — the  latter 
the  half-breed  relatives  of  the  former — live  in 
their  squalid  mud-brick  hovels. 

The  streets  were  wider  now,  in  fact  they  were 
nothing  but  a  series  of  ragged  gullies,  along 
whose  dry  banks  straggled  the  grimy  dwellings. 
Always,  in  some  of  them,  there  is  a  fiesta  of  some 
kind,  a  birth,  a  wedding,  a  death,  a  special 
church  celebration,  or  perhaps  some  pantheistic 


iiiil^       ^HE^w             '^   ^ 

■l 

H^M 

% 

^^K^^ 

^^H|K-'         ^^s  hTT<jIHH^ 

\Ai 

""^*.^\y 

^^^^ 

JirTfc  »      aHl^ 

Prisoners  Along  the  Trail  up  from  La  Paz 


OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    107 

festival  that  still  lingers  in  their  dulled  history 
and  has  prudently  merged  itself  with  the 
piously  ordained  occasions.  The  orgy  of  the 
night  is  past,  yet  from  here  and  there  come  the 
feeble  tootings  of  a  drunken  flute,  an  instrument 
that  every  Aymara  seems  to  be  able  to  play  as  a 
birthright,  whose  mournful  and  monotonous 
strains  drift  through  the  thin  air  from  some  less 
stupefied  celebrant. 

The  Aymara  love  of  their  primitive  music  is 
very  strong;  it  is  universal  among  them  and, 
while  their  primitive  flute,  pandean  pipe  and 
crude  drum  interpret  the  joy  ordinarily,  yet 
they  take  cheerfully  to  any  new  form  of  musical 
instrument,  and  in  some  miraculous  way  learn, 
in  time,  to  produce  the  same  series  of  ragged, 
droning  sounds.  The  accordion,  concertina  and 
mouth  organ  are  much  beloved  and  once  I  even 
heard  a  self-taught  Aymara  band  of  brass  horns, 
cornet,  tenor  horn,  bass,  and  a  slide  and  key 
trombone,  playing  the  Aymara  airs  with  their 
own  home-made  orchestration.  The  govern- 
ment bandmaster  had  drilled  a  large  military 
band  that  used  to  give  concerts  twice  a  week  in 
the  plaza  and  there  was  not  an  approach  to  a 
white  man  in  the  outfit,  it  was  composed  wholly 


io8  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

of  Cholos  and  Aymaras  from  the  little  boy 
drummers  to  the  great  horns  that  curled  like  a 
blanket-roll  over  the  shoulder. 

Rapidly  the  first  silver  of  the  morning  deep- 
ened to  richer  tints  and  glowed  above  the  pur- 
ple silhouette  of  the  rim  of  the  great  gorge, 
while  Illimani,  the  perpetually  snow-capped 
mountain  that  overshadowed  La  Paz,  burst  into 
splendid  prismatic  bloom  as  the  first  direct  rays 
of  the  sun  shimmered  over  its  slopes  and  ice 
peaks;  below,  the  gorge  and  the  city  slowly 
lightened  and  glimmered  in  detail  through  the 
frosty,  early  morning  mists.  The  thin  bitter  air 
of  the  night  was  gone;  it  was  cold  still,  but  the 
thin  high  air  held  in  some  indefinable  way  the 
promise  of  a  seductive  warmth. 

The  long  line  of  pack  mules  climbed  steadily 
upward;  the  rambling,  hovel-lined  streets  were 
gone  and  only  now  and  then  we  passed  a  little 
mud  hut  with  its  one  door  as  the  sole  aperture, 
the  headquarters  of  the  tiny  Aymara  truck 
farm.  The  acrid  smoke  from  their  cooking- 
fire  leaked  through  the  blackened  roof  and  rose 
in  little  spirals  straight  up  through  the  still  air, 
while  the  members  of  the  household  squatted  in 
the  chill  sun,  muffled  to  the  eyes  in  ponchos  and 


OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    109 

with  woolen  cap  and  superimposed  hat  drawn 
down  to  meet  the  mufflings,  squatted  in  the 
chilly  sunlight.  They  muffle  themselves  in  this 
way  at  the  slightest  suggestion  of  chill  in  the 
air;  but  from  the  thighs  down  they  are  indiffer- 
ent to  cold  or  storm.  It  makes  no  difference  if 
they  are  in  a  blizzard  blowing  over  one  of  the 
high  Andean  passes,  they  will  trudge  along  with 
legs  bare  to  above  the  knees,  but  with  heads  and 
throats  muffled  deep  in  woolens.  I  have  seen 
them  make  a  camp  in  a  driving  snow-storm  and 
go  peacefully  to  sleep  with  their  heads  carefully 
enshrouded,  and  awake  at  daybreak  none  the 
worse  for  the  experience,  though  their  bare  legs 
were  drifted  over  with  sno^  and  their  sandals 
stiffened  with  ice. 

Along  the  road  that  climbed  up  the  side  of 
the  great  crack  in  the  high  plateau  that  formed 
the  valley  of  La  Paz,  little  groups  of  Aymaras 
who  had  camped  there  during  the  night  were 
packing  their  trains  of  llamas  and  burros  for 
the  last  short  distance  in  to  the  La  Paz  markets. 
Often,  without  taking  the  trouble  to  cook,  they 
would  gnaw  on  a  piece  of  raw  chalona — the 
split  carcass  of  a  sheep  dried  in  the  sun  and  cold 
of  the  high  plateaus — which  has  about  as  much 


no  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

flavor  as  an  old  buggy  whip.  Sometimes  they 
ate  parched  corn  or  chuno — the  latter  the 
native  potato,  shrunken  and  small  after  the  dry- 
ing in  the  high  air  in  the  same  treatment  as  the 
chalona  receives — and  tasting  very  much  like  a 
cork  bottle  stopper.  But  always  they  chewed 
coca,  the  leaf  that  furnishes  cocaine.  Leaf  by 
leaf  they  would  stow  it  away,  and  add  a  little 
ashes  and  oil  scraped  out  of  a  pouch  with  a 
needle  of  bone.  Among  the  older  Aymaras, 
the  cheek  frequently  has  developed  a  sagging 
pouch  from  the  years  of  distention  with  coca. 
Aside  from  that,  it  seems  to  have  no  effect  upon 
them. 

The  Aymara  pack-trains  of  burros  would  pass 
us  with  indifference,  half  hidden  in  great 
sheaves  of  cehada — barley — or  with  chickens 
slung  in  ponchos  on  either  side  and  with  only 
their  heads  visible  and  swaying  in  time  to  the 
gait  of  the  burro.  But  the  llamas  would  go 
mincing  past,  crowding  as  far  as  possible  against 
the  other  side  of  the  road  with  an  obvious  as- 
sumption of  fright.  Their  slitted  nostrils 
would  twitch  and  their  slender  ears  wiggle  in  an 
agony  of  nervousness,  while  their  eyes,  the  most 
beautiful,  pleading,  liquid  eyes  in  the  animal 


0  UT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    1 1 1 

world  would  be 
humid  with  hysteri- 
cal fear.  Yet  from 
their  infancy  they 
have  seen  men  and 
horses,  pack-trains, 
and  all  the  travel 
of  the  mountains 
and  plateaus.  But 
the  apparent  gen- 
tleness of  the  llama 
is  purely  superfic- 
ial; for  it  can  spit 
with  unpleasant  ac-  aymara  driver  of  pack  llamas. 
curacy  to  repel  a  frontal  approach,  while  its  rear 
and  flanks  are  guarded  by  padded  feet  that  are 
vicious  in  their  power  and  uncertainty.  To  the 
Aymara  the  llama  is  transportation,  food,  wool, 
and  fuel.  An  Aymara  child  can  do  anything 
with  a  llama,  and  with  nothing  more  than  her 
shrill  little  voice;  but  in  the  presence  of  a  white 
man  it  is  a  creature  of  hysterical  and  timid 
peevishness. 

As  we  filed  by  these  pack-trains,  the  Aymara 
driver  would  remove  his  native  hat  of  coarse 
felt,  leaving  the  head  still  covered  by  his  gay, 


112 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


>i^«^.  ^ 


woolen  nightcap 
with  its  flapping 
ear-tabs,  and  mur- 
mur a  respectful 
''  Tata! ''  to  which 
we  would  politely 
return  a  *' Buenos 
d'las,  tata'^  unless 
the  driver  hap- 
pened to  be  a 
woman,  in  which 
case  we  would  sub- 
stitute the  corres- 
ponding ''  Mama^' 
for  the  ''  Tatar 
The  women  would 
plod  along  barefooted  while  they  spun  yarn 
from  a  bundle  of  dirty,  raw  wool  held  un- 
der one  arm.  As  the  yarn  was  spun,  it  was 
gathered  on  a  top-like  distaff  dangling  at  the  end 
of  the  woolen  thread.  In  some  miraculous  way 
it  was  never  permitted  to  lose  its  spinning  twirl, 
and  at  the  right  moment  always  absorbed  the 
additional  thread,  so  that  it  never  was  permitted 
to  drag  along  the  trail.  At  her  little  home 
somewhere  on  the  inter- Andean  plateau,  she  will 


MEMBERS  OF  A  GANG  OP  PRISONERS. 


I 


0  UT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    113 

afterwards  dye  the  wool  and  knit  one  of  those 
night-caps  or  weave  a  poncho,  according  to  some 
rough  tribal  pattern,  so  tight  that  it  will  shed 
water  as  well  as  a  London  raincoat.  Her  loom 
will  be  two  logs  laid  on  the  ground,  on  which 
the  warp  is  stretched ;  the  shuttle  will  be  carved 
from  the  bone  of  a  sheep,  and  the  threads  will 
be  beaten  into  place  with  the  sharpened  shin- 
bone  of  a  sheep.  Weeks  may  be  spent  in  the 
patient  weaving.  Whether  she  is  on  the  trail 
or  is  weaving,  she  has  usually  a  pudgy,  expres- 
sionless baby  of  a  tarnished  copper  color  held  in 
the  fold  of  the  poncho  that  is  knotted  across  her 
shoulders.  Sometimes  a  prosperous  Aymara 
gentleman,  with  his  pack  animals,  passed  us 
and  then  he  was  apt  to  be  accompanied  by  sev- 
eral Aymara  women  and  their  assortment  of  tar- 
nished copper  babies,  the  women  being  his 
wives,  who  assist  in  the  heavier  work  of  driving 
and  packing  with  complaisant  domestic  affec- 
tion. 

This  road  up  from  the  great,  raw  gulch  of  La 
Paz  was  full  of  life;  pack-train  after  pack-train 
passed,  loaded  with  the  daily  supplies  for  that 
city.  All  of  the  trails  of  the  high  plateau  above 
converge  to  feed  it  and  it  broadens  out  into  a 


114 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


thh:  guard  for  the:  road  menders. 

real  road,  no  longer  a  trail,  under  the  needs  of 
the  heavier  traffic.  A  group  of  sandaled 
soldiers  was  apparently  detailed  to  act  as  road- 
masters  ;  and  they  would  stop  the  Aymaras  and 
enforce  a  bit  of  labor  in  aid  of  the  gang  of 
prisoners  under  their  guard.  The  instant  dull 
and  sullen  submission  of  the  Indians  at  once  in- 
dicated their  position  in  the  Bolivian  scale. 

Steadily  during  the  early  morning  hours  we 
climbed,  until  the  rim  of  the  high  plateau  itself 
was  only  a  short  distance  ahead.  Worn 
through  the   rim  by  generations  of   plodding 


OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    115 

hoofs  was  a  crooked  trail,  so  narrow  that  the 
mules  bumped  and  scrabbled  along,  and  we 
emerged,  as  through  a  trap-door,  out  on  the  end- 
less distances  of  the  vast  inter-Andean  plateau. 
Below,  losing  itself  in  the  distant  haze,  stretched 
the  ragged  crack  that  made  the  valley  of  La  Paz 
and  miles  away,  quivering  in  the  slowly  warm- 
ing air,  was  the  city  itself,  a  tiny  clutter  of  gaudy 
houses  and  red-tiled  roofs,  with  the  brilliant 
green  of  the  little  park  making  a  sharp  contrast 
in  color.  Elsewhere  the  slopes  of  the  valley 
were  as  destitute  of  verdure  as  when  they  were 
blown  into  existence  by  the  terrific  forces  of 
primeval  nature.  Yet  in  this  desert  barrenness 
there  was  no  lack  of  color;  in  the  cool  of  the 
morning  the  shadows  were  soft  in  every  delicate 
variation  of  purple  and  amethyst;  the  bare  soil 
and  the  jagged  slopes  blended  and  shifted  in 
ochers  and  vermilions,  in  golden  tints  and  cop- 
per hues  and,  scattered  here  and  there,  were 
little  patches  of  greens  where  some  little,  irri- 
gated Aymara  truck-farm  was  breaking  into  the 
world  against  the  moist  chocolate-colored  soil. 
Beyond— and  in  their  immensity  there  was  no 
suggestion  of  their  great  distance — rose  the 
jagged  fangs  of  the  last  and  most  interior  range 


ii6 


ACROSS   THE  ANDES 


V-  t  -         -^ 


WHILE  RODRIGUEZ  AND  HIS  CHOLO  HELPERS  TIGHTENED  THE  RAW- 
HIDE  CINCHES   AND   REPLACED   THE   PACKS. 

of  the  Andes,  with  their  black  cliffs  and  scarred 
flanks     disappearing     under     the     everlasting 


OUT  OF  LA  PAZ  BY  PACK  TRAIN    1 17 

mantles  of  snow;  over  all,  was  the  clear,  shim- 
mering turquoise  heaven  of  the  high  altitudes. 

Down  in  that  valley  were  the  little  cafes,  the 
little  shops  with  imported  trinkets,  the  plaza 
Sunday  afternoons  with  the  band  and  the  parad- 
ing elite  and  all  the  little  functions  of  civiliza- 
tion, yet  this  city  is  fairly  balanced  on  the  edge 
of  the  frontier,  while  beyond  were  the  high 
passes  and  the  vague  interior  of  South  America, 
the  last  of  the  great  primitive  domains,  where 
men  still  exist  by  means  of  bow  and  arrow  or 
stone  club,  and  where  the  ethical  right  and  the 
physical  ability  to  survive  are  yet  indistinguish- 
able. 

From  this  edge  of  the  plateau  the  narrow 
trails  run  in  all  directions  like  the  sticks  of  a  fan. 
Trained  from  many  previous  trips,  the  pack- 
animals  halted  or  wandered  aside,  nibbling  at 
the  tufts  of  dry  bunch-grass,  while  Rodriguez 
and  his  two  Cholo  helpers  tightened  the  raw- 
hide cinches  and  replaced  the  packs  that  had 
shifted  in  the  long  climb  and  scramble  through 
the  narrow  gully.  Then,  with  the  bell  on  the 
leading  pack-animal  tinkling  monotonously,  be- 
gan the  steady  plodding  in  single  file  along  one 
of  the  furrowed  trails. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  BACK  TRAIL  AMONG  THE  AYMARAS 

AT  first  the  plateau  was  dotted  with  the 
lines  of  converging  burro-  and  llama- 
trains,  but,  as  the  morning  passed,  there 
was  nothing  but  the  lonely  distance  of  the 
plateau,  with  here  and  there  a  tiny  speck  of  a 
solitary  pack-train.  The  air  had  warmed 
rapidly  under  the  sun;  the  light  breeze  had  the 
touch  of  a  northern  spring,  and  I  yielded  to  the 
seductive  suggestion  and  strapped  my  heavy 
woolen  coat  to  the  saddle.  Five  minutes  later  I 
halted  and  gladly  put  it  on  once  more,  for  the 
thin  air  was  treacherous  in  its  allurements. 

Somewhere  about  the  middle  of  the  day  we 
halted  for  breakfast  at  Cocuta,  a  native  tambo 
or  wayside  inn,  though  the  pack-train  pushed  on 
slowly,  nibbling  the  bunch-grass  as  it  went. 
The  tambo  was  surrounded  by  a  high,  thick 
mud-brick  wall  that  inclosed  something  over  an 
acre  of  ground,  and  inside  this  fortress  were  the 

Ii8 


AMONG    THE   AYMARAS         119 

little  mud  buildings,  granaries,  and  corrals.  An 
old  Aymara  woman  cooked  our  breakfast  over  a 
llama-dung  fire  in  one  corner  of  the  room,  and 
it  was  served  on  a  rough  table  over  by  a  dried 
mud  bench  that  was  built  against  two  of  the 
walls.  The  filthy  room  was  lighted  only  by  the 
small,  low  doors,  the  high,  mud  sills  of  which 
still  further  shut  out  light  and  ventilation,  and 
the  fetid  atmosphere  was  rich  in  its  ethnological 
and  entomological  suggestion.  A  chicken  soup, 
reeking  with  the  mutton  tallow  of  chalona  and 
with  the  head  and  feet  of  the  fowl  floating  in 
the  grease,  made  the  first  course;  then  came 
lomita  (the  tenderloin  of  a  steak),  and  eggs 
fried  in  mutton  tallow.  We  produced  some 
coffee  from  the  saddle-bags  and  the  old  woman 
fluttered  about  and  brewed  a  pretty  fair  article. 
It  was  at  this  same  Cocuta,  on  another  occa- 
sion, that,  in  riding  to  La  Paz,  I  ran  into  a 
band  of  drunken  ladrones  and,  as  some  ol  the 
band  took  the  trail  after  me,  it  gave  a  most  un- 
welcome and  interesting  zest  to  the  rest  of  that 
night  ride. 

That  night  we  slept  in  a  second  tambo, 
smaller,  but  also  with  a  thick  mud  wall  inclos- 
ing the  collection  of  mud  huts.    The  mules 


I20  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

were  turned  loose  on  the  plateau  to  graze  till 
morning,  their  hobbled  feet  a  guarantee  of  their 
not  straying.  At  sunset  came  the  piercing  cold, 
when  even  the  barricaded  door  of  the  mud  room 
and  the  steaming  human  warmth  inside  proved 
grateful.  A  wide  platform  of  mud-bricks  was 
the  bed — it  was  the  sole  furniture — and  on  it 
we  piled  the  sheepskins  from  the  pack-saddles, 
and  over  an  alcohol  lamp  we  made  a  thin  tea  and 
warmed  up  some  tinned  things.  An  old 
Aymara  woman  was  apparently  the  sole  care- 
taker of  this  tambo,  but  she  viewed  us  with  un- 
lovely eyes  and  would  furnish  nothing.  Sullen 
and  surly  that  night,  she  was  all  ingratiating 
smiles  the  next  morning  when  she  saw  my 
camera.  She  scuttled  inside  her  hut  and  then 
reappeared  in  some  hasty  finery,  in  which  she 
trotted  anxiously  about  with  conciliatory  grim- 
aces and  pleadings  in  guttural  Aymara  that  her 
picture  be  taken.  How  she  knew  what  a 
camera  was  for  and,  further,  why  she  was  not 
afraid  of  it  were  mysteries,  for  invariably  I 
found  all  other  Aymaras  hostile  against  the 
evil  witchcraft  of  the  little  black  box.  As  it 
was  yet  only  early  dawn,  there  was  not  sufficient 
light,  but  I  satisfied  her  by  clicking  the  shutter. 


AMONG    THE  AY  MAR  AS        121 

After  the  heated  air  in  the  dark  hut,  the  first 
moment  outside  in  the  pure,  still  cold  was  like 
breathing  needles;  the  long  stretch  of  plateau 
was  soft  with  white  frost,  every  grimy  straw  in 
the  thatched  roofs  glistened  like  silver  with  its 
coating  of  ice,  and  the  morning  ablutions  were 
performed  through  a  hole  broken  in  the  crust  of 
ice  in  a  near-by  brook.  A  cup  of  tea  boiled  over 
the  alcohol  lamp  was  the  only  breakfast,  and 
then  we  started.  As  we  climbed  into  the 
saddles  the  old  Aymara  woman  hovered  in  the 
gateway  clucking  pleased  Aymara  benedictions 
for  her  photograph. 

For  some  reason  of  his  own  Rodriguez  elected 
to  leave  the  main  trail  beyond  this  tambo  and 
take  one  of  the  little-used  back  trails  to  Sorata. 
It  was  very  much  shorter  but,  as  we  afterward 
learned,  is  little  used  on  account  of  the  surly, 
hostile  attitude  of  the  Aymaras  of  that  district 
and,  except  for  a  large  outfit,  is  not  considered 
safe.  Here  the  Aymaras  are  more  secluded  and 
view  intrusion  with  aggressive  suspicion;  three 
months  before  they  had  attacked  an  outfit  and 
killed  the  trader.  Those  who  passed  no  longer 
greeted  us  with  the  "Tata!"  Instead,  they 
would  turn  sullenly  out  of  the  trail  to  avoid  us 


122  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

as  we  passed,  or  stop  and  view  us  with  unmistak- 
able hostility.  When  we  halted  for  a  hasty  bite 
by  the  side  of  a  cold  brook,  Rodriguez  held  the 
whole  pack-train  and  the  arrieros  close  by,  and 
did  not  allow  them  to  go  ahead,  as  on  the  day 
before. 

Just  before  branching  off  into  this  unused 
trail  we  came  upon  a  large  party  of  Aymaras 
carrying,  in  relays,  a  stretcher  on  their  shoulders 
that  was  inclosed  with  cloth,  so  that  it  resembled 
a  sort  of  palanquin ;  six  of  them  were  carrying  it 
at  a  time  in  a  ground-eating  dog-trot  and  about 
each  half-mile  they  would  be  relieved  by  six 
others,  the  transfer  of  the  stretcher  being 
effected  without  jolt  or  jar.  It  proved  to  be  a 
wealthy  Bolivian  haciendado  who  was  ill,  and 
was  being  carried  in  this  simple  ambulance  to 
the  doctors  in  La  Paz  by  his  own  Indians.  The 
trot  and  the  burden  were  nothing  to  them;  I 
have  seen  an  Aymara  boy  carry  forty  pounds  on 
his  back  and  trot  hour  after  hour  without  appar- 
ent difficulty  and  come  into  camp  at  night  but 
little  behind  the  mounted  man  he  was  accom- 
panying. Yet  at  this  altitude,  unless  one  has 
become  gradually  accustomed,  even  walking  is  a 
heavy  effort. 


AMONG   THE  AYMARAS        123 


AYMARA    HERDERS   PLAYED  THEIR  WEIRD   ELUTES. 

On  the  new  trail  the  dead  level  of  the  plateau 
gave  way  to  more  rolling  country,  the  ragged, 
snow-capped  line  of  mountains  at  the  horizon 
came  closer;  Huayna-Potosi  loomed  on  our 
right,  and,  growing  more  impressive  every  hour, 
was  the  great,  white  mass  of  Mount  Sorata,  dead 
ahead.  Then  the  rolling  country  closed  in,  and 
narrower  valleys  succeeded,  with  the  rugged 
foot-hills  on  each  side.  In  this  part  was  an 
enormous  breeding-ground  for  llamas ;  for  miles 
the  hills  were  dotted  with  them.  Baby  llamas, 
very  new,  and  still  blinking  at  the  strange  world, 
huddled  timidly  in  behind  a  tuft  of  bunch-grass 
or  behind  some  small  boulder,  while  the  queer, 
goose-necked  mother  stood  near  with  apparent 
indifference;  little  llamas  in  all  stages  of  adole- 
scence and  awkwardness  gamboled  on  the  hill- 


124  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

sides,  and  herds  dotting  the  slopes  looked  for  all 
the  world  like  big,  stiff-necked,  grotesque  sheep. 
Among  them  were  the  Aymara  herders  who, 
like  traditional  shepherds,  played  their  weird 
and  mournful  flutes  or  pipes.  Over  and  over 
again  came  the  same  strain,  which  carried  for 
miles  in  the  thin,  still  air. 

One  of  its  little  phrases  curiously  reminded 
me  of  that  chanted  taunt  of  my  boyhood,  "  Over 
the  fence  is  ou-oot!  " 

Rarely  does  the  Aymara  make  his  own  flute  or 
pipe,  simple  though  it  is;  their  manufacture  is  a 
native  industry  by  itself.  Like  a  true  musician, 
the  Aymara  must  have  his  instrument  just  so, 
and  up  in  the  higher  altitudes  the  flutes  are  made 
and  brought  down  to  be  sold  in  the  market  on 
the  days  of  fiesta.  His  single  weapon,  a  sling  of 
the  pattern  made  famous  by  David  and  Goliath, 
is  of  twisted  llama-wool,  and  will  throw  a  stone 
the  size  of  a  lemon.  They  develop  a  wonderful 
skill  in  its  use. 

On  this  lonely  trail  we  came  upon  a  castle,  a 
veritable  castle  of  the  story  books !  Alone,  grim 
and  battlemented,  it  stood  boldly  outlined 
against  the  landscape.  It  was  not  large,  but  it 
was,  or  had  been,  perfect  in  every  medieval  de- 


AMONG    THE  AYMARAS        125 

tail,  and  was  constructed  of  mud  bricks  from 
outer  walls  to  keep.  There  was  a  moat,  dry  and 
unkept  and  now  fallen  upon  evil  days ;  the  high 
surrounding  wall  was  loopholed,  and  the  fringe 
of  battlements  had  been  eaten  away  in  places  by 
the  driving  storms.  The  keep  was  visible  rising 
above  the  wall,  while  galleries  and  overhanging 
balconies  showed  the  purposes  and  possibilities 
of  protection,  even  should  the  outer  wall  be  suc- 
cessfully stormed  by  some  ancient  foe;  the 
single,  heavy  outer  gate  in  the  wall  was  barred, 
and  not  a  sign  of  life  or  of  a  retainer  was  to  be 
seen.  For  miles  around  the  country  was  de- 
serted and  bare,  and  in  the  desolate  mountains 
remained  this  substance  of  the  past  like  a  grim, 
dramatic  ghost  of  ancient  days.  Back  on  this 
unused  trail  it  is  but  little  known;  Rodriguez 
knew  of  it,  but  that  was  all,  except  that  he  had 
a  very  positive  idea  that  its  owner  or  occupant 
did  not  care  for  visitors — but  it  was  occupied. 

Monotonously  through  the  afternoon  the 
pack-train  wound  through  the  narrow  valleys, 
and  closer  came  the  mountains  and  more  chill 
the  air  sweeping  downward  from  their  fields  of 
snow.  The  melting  snows  flooded  the  slopes 
and  valleys  in  innumerable  brooks;  often  the 


126  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

trail  Itself  was  lost  in  wide  expanses  of  icy  water. 
The  sun  set,  and  with  growing  darkness  came 
the  increased  bitterness  of  the  piercing  cold. 
Along  this  trail  there  was  no  shelter  except  here 
and  there  the  little  mud  huts  of  the  Aymara. 

The  clouds  rolling  low  overhead  left  the 
night  pitch-black;  a  gale  of  wind  sprang  up  and 
hurled  itself  in  our  teeth,  varying  its  monotony 
now  and  again  with  a  squall  of  snow  that  stung 
like  a  blizzard.  Without  a  stumble  the  sure- 
footed mules  kept  the  trail  in  the  darkness  up 
and  down  through  abrupt  gullies  or  fording 
some  icy  stream  that  left  their  bellies  a  fringe  of 
icicles,  while,  during  some  lull  in  the  blast,  the 
tinkle  of  the  bell  on  the  leading  pack-animal 
would  drift  back  to  us. 

At  last  the  old,  deserted  tambo  for  which  we 
had  been  aiming  was  reached.  By  the  aid  of  a 
few  matches — for  the  lantern  was  carefully 
packed  on  some  mule  indistinguishable  in  the 
blackness — half  a  dozen  Aymaras  were  found 
sleeping  in  the  litter  on  the  floor  of  the  mud 
room,  for  here  there  was  not  even  a  mud  bench. 
There  was  no  barricade  to  close  the  door,  and  a 
score  of  eddies  whirled  in  from  the  broken 
thatch    overhead.      The    arrieros    drove    the 


AMONG    THE  AYMARAS        127 

Aymaras  out — they  were  part  of  a  pack-train, 
and  not  natives  of  that  district — and  threw  the 
sheepskin  pads  over  the  muddy  ground.  The 
alcohol-lamp,  screened  from  drafts  by  saddles, 
sheepskins,  and  hats,  finally  furnished  a  luke- 
warm tin  of  soup,  some  thin,  warm  tea,  and  some 
eggs,  which  though  warm,  could  hardly  be  con- 
sidered cooked.  The  bitter  wind  swept  through 
the  openings,  and  no  candle  could  survive,  so 
purely  by  a  sense  of  touch  the  frozen  spurs  and 
puttees  were  unbuckled  for  the  instant  sleep  that 
came,  clothes  and  all. 

At  the  break  of  day  we  were  again  in  the 
saddle.  The  trail  the  previous  day  had  been 
hard  and  rough,  but  following  a  general  level; 
but  from  now  on  it  began  steadily  to  rise.  Early 
in  the  morning  we  had  gained  upon  Mount 
Sorata;  in  the  deceptive  distance  it  loomed  ap- 
parently only  a  few  miles  ahead,  yet  its  nearest 
snow-field  was  thirty  miles  away.  Lake  Titicaca 
is  only  a  few  miles  distant,  and  one  of  its  long 
arms  reaches  back  into  the  country  in  a  vast, 
shallow  lagoon  covered  with  a  water  growth 
through  which  swim  myriads  of  fearless  water- 
fowls. In  some  ancient  time  a  causeway  was 
built  over  this  long  arm,  solid  and  substantial. 


128  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

and  on  each  side,  as  we  passed  over,  ducks  and 
snipe  and  waders  eyed  us  impudently,  the  length 
of  a  fishing  rod  away,  and  one,  a  snipe,  flickered 
along  almost  under  the  heels  of  the  pack-mules. 
Off  in  the  distance  was  the  old  Aymara  city  of 
Achicachi,  still  surrounded  by  the  remains  of  an 
old  mud  wall  that  dates  from  before  Pizarro, 
where  the  frosted  thatch  and  tile  roofs  glittered 
in  the  sunlight  against  the  distant  cold  blue  hori- 
zon of  Lake  Titicaca. 

Beyond  the  causeway  the  trail  rose  steadily  to 
the  mountain  pass.  The  cold  mists  from  Sorata 
swept  down  and  the  line  of  mules  disappeared 
in  its  chill  fog.  It  thins,  slender  wraiths  of 
eddying  vapor  drift  past,  and  we  ride  through 
the  ruins  of  an  ancient  Aymara  town  where 
there  was  nothing  left  but  the  rectangular  lines 
of  stone  debris ;  the  few  streets  were  still  plainly 
marked,  though  the  village  has  been  dead  these 
many  centuries.  Its  name  is  lost;  it  is  not  even 
a  tradition.  From  under  some  ruined  rubbish 
an  Aymara  head  was  thrust  out,  framed  in  the 
acrid,  thin  smoke  from  the  wretched,  make-shift 
hut;  a  few  sheep  were  herded  within  the  ruined 
inclosures,  and  other  small  flocks  were  grazing 
near.     The  head  proved  to  belong  to  their  shep- 


I 


The  Few  Streets  Were  Still  Plainly  Marked,  Though  the 
Village  Has  Been  Dead  These  Many  Centuries 


AMONG    THE  AYMARAS        129 

herd,  tending  them  until  the  time  of  their  trans- 
mutation into  chalona. 

Now  and  again  an  Aymara  shrine  loomed 
through  the  mist  beside  the  trail,  in  its  niche  an 
offering  of  wilted  flowers  and  some  cigarette  pic- 
tures, and  above,  in  a  crevice  of  the  stones  and 
dried  mud,  a  crooked  twig  cross.  Sometimes  we 
met  an  Aymara,  with  a  bundle  of  reeds,  sitting 
in  the  shelter  of  a  rough  stone  wind-break  mak- 
ing and  testing  his  reed  flutes.  He  whittled  the 
reed  and  tested  each  finger-hole  as  he  scraped  it 
larger.  He  looked  up,  and  again  we  were 
saluted  with  the  respectful  "  Tatal  "  for  in  order 
to  reach  the  last  stage  of  the  mountain  pass  we 
had  swung  back  on  the  main  trail,  where  the  In- 
dians were  more  sociable.  More  stone  and  mud 
shrines  appeared,  each  with  its  offering  of  pro- 
pitiation to  the  gods  of  these  higher  places  and 
each  with  its  twig  cross  above. 

Higher,  rougher,  and  steeper  grew  the  trail, 
often  in  a  zigzag  up  some  precipitous  gorge.  A 
tiny,  scattering  Indian  village  came  in  sight, 
Huaylata,  perched  on  a  high,  rolling  part  of  this 
Andean  pass.  Its  mud  huts  were  smaller, 
grimier,  and  drearier,  if  possible,  than  those  that 
we  had  passed  on  the  great  plateau.     A  few 


130  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Aymaras  appeared  and  tried  to  sell  us  cebada,  or 
barley,  for  the  mules ;  an  old  woman,  squatting 
on  the  ground,  weaving  a  poncho  on  her  log 
loom,  stopped  long  enough  to  look  over  our 
cavalcade  curiously  out  of  her  bleared  eyes  red 
with  smoke.  Through  the  little  door  of  her  hut 
the  interior  was  visible,  stacked  with  chalona 
half  prepared  and  waiting  for  the  sun  to  shine 
before  it  was  moved  out  into  the  open  ground 
for  further  drying. 

Indifferently  she  watched  me  extract  the 
camera  from  my  saddle-bag,  but  when  the  brass 
lens  pointed  in  her  direction,  she  clattered 
vigorously  in  her  dialect  and  scuttled  into  the 
house  to  hide.  The  other  Aymaras  were  in- 
stantly hostile,  and  I  worked  a  scheme  that  had 
often  succeeded.  I  turned  my  back  to  them  and 
reversed  the  camera,  with  the  lens  pointing  back- 
ward under  my  arm.  This  would  almost  in- 
variably get  the  picture.  If  it  did  not,  I  would 
stand  behind  the  broad  shoulders  of  one  of  the 
party  while  I  adjusted  the  camera,  and  then 
have  him  step  suddenly  to  one  side  as  I  pressed 
the  button.  Otherwise  they  would  scatter  like 
a  flock  of  Chinamen  under  similar  conditions, 
and  with  angry  mutterings. 


CHAPTER  IX 

OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS 

THE  intermittent  fog  and  mist  turned  to  a 
cold  rain  that  drove  in  stinging  gusts 
square  in  our  faces.  Slowly  we  climbed, 
and  went  a  few  miles  beyond  the  divide.  A 
huge  pile  of  loose  stones  marked  the  spot,  a  tri- 
bute to  the  particular  god  of  this  high  place  that 
had  slowly  accumulated  with  the  offerings  of 
Aymaras  that  had  passed  the  spot.  The  pile 
was  larger  than  an  Aymara  hut,  and  on  the  sum- 
mit was  a  little  cross  of  twigs  from  which  a  few 
strips  of  calico  fluttered  in  the  gale.  At  the 
base  were  curious  little  altars  made  by  two  flat 
stones  laid  edge  up,  and  with  a  third  long,  flat 
stone  across  them.  They  symbolized  a  house 
and  were  erected  by  some  prospective  Aymara 
bridegroom  or  house-builder  in  propitiation 
for  his  enterprise.  The  cross  that  surmounted 
all  of  these  shrines  and  piles  of  stone  has  been 
readily  adopted  by  the  pantheistic  Aymara,  who 

131 


132  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

is  only  too  fearful  lest  some  unknown  god  may 
have  escaped  his  efforts  at  placation.  Around 
the  base  of  the  cairn  were  the  withered  and 
frost-bitten  remains  of  floral  offerings  and  also 
the  scraps  of  cigarette  pictures,  the  latter,  from 
their  invariableness,  apparently  one  of  the  chief 
delights  of  the  gods. 

At  rare  intervals  some  eddying  rift  would  be 
blown  in  the  mists,  and  for  a  brief  moment 
Mount  Sorata  would  stand  clear  and  sharp 
against  the  blue  patch  of  sky,  with  its  great  white 
shoulder  scarcely  more  than  five  miles  away 
across  a  precipitous  gorge.  High  above  our 
world  it  seemed  to  rise,  a  titanic,  bulking, 
cataclysmic  mass,  magnificent  in  its  immensity. 
Enormous  cliffs  of  snow  towered  above  the 
scarred,  black  gorges  of  its  flanks,  glittering  in 
the  flash  of  momentary  sunlight  and  iridescent  in 
the  purple  shadows.  High  against  its  face 
clouds  were  born  and  were  shredded  in  the  blast 
of  an  unseen  gale;  now  and  again  an  avalanche 
of  snow  broke  from  some  slope  and  was  whirled 
in  a  feathery  spray  into  the  shadows  of  a  gorge 
thousands  of  feet  below.  It  could  blanket  a 
dozen  villages,  yet  it  was  diminished  on  the  tre- 
mendous slopes  until  it  seemed  no  more  than  the 


OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    133 


BI,IZZARDS  BI.OWING  OV^R  THE  ANDEAN  PASSES. 

tiny  avalanche  on  a  tin  roof  at  home;  before  it 
can  fall  to  the  depths  of  the  gorge  a  gale  has 
caught  it  and  it  is  blown  in  a  stinging  blizzard 
half  way  across  the  mountain's  face.  Vertically, 
nearly  two  miles  above  the  trail  across  the 
divide,  rose  the  white  fang  of  the  summit,  that 
has  still  defied  all  efforts  at  scaling;  there,  ac- 
cording to  the  Aymara  belief,  is  the  chief  treas- 
ure of  the  god  of  the  mountain,  a  great  golden 
bull.  The  generous  pantheism  of  the  Aymara 
has  given  a  similar  golden  treasure  to  the  sum- 


134  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

mit  of  Illomani  back  near  La  Paz,  but  in  that 
case,  in  order  that  the  balance  of  conflicting  reli- 
gions might  be  kept,  it  is  a  huge  cross  of  gold. 

The  difficulties  and  inaccessibility  of  these 
mountains  conveys,  to  the  Aymara  mind,  the 
idea  that  they  are  inhabited  by  the  most  power- 
ful and  exclusive  of  the  gods.  That  hint  of  ex- 
clusiveness  is  enough  for  them  and  only  with  the 
greatest  difficulty  have  they  been  prevailed  upon 
to  accompany  the  few  climbing  expeditions, 
while  weird  stories  still  circulate  among  them  as 
to  the  howling  and  malignant  devils  that  ride 
the  storms  in  the  great  gorges  high  up.  The 
Aymara  is  already  suppiled  with  enough  lesser 
deities  that  require  continuous  and  troublesome 
propitiation  so  that  he  does  not  care  to  go  out  of 
his  way  up  into  Sorata  and  incur  another,  and 
possibly  hostile  and  irritated  theistic  burden. 

After  the  cairn  that  marks  the  divide  is 
passed,  the  trail  leads  abruptly  downward.  At 
first  it  is  a  relief  to  lean  back  in  the  saddle  and 
feel  the  strain  come  on  the  crupper  while  the 
breast-strap  flaps  loosely  once  more,  but  hour 
after  hour  of  constant  descent  and  the  constant 
straining  back  in  the  saddle  become  more  irk- 
some and  monotonous  than  was  the  leaning  for- 


OFER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    135 

ward  on  the  upward  climb.  The  mists  and  cold 
rains  blow  in  lighter  patches  and  with  a  softer 
touch;  even  occasionally  the  deep  valleys  below 
can  be  seen  marked  out  in  irregular  surfaces  of 
soft  green  where  the  Aymara  farms  are  budding. 
The  descent  is  rapid;  the  pack-train  coils  about 
among  the  buttresses  of  the  mountains  along  a 
broad  shelf  that  is  often  cut  into  the  steep  slopes, 
and  always  plunging  downward.  We  were  al- 
most below  the  line  of  clouds,  and  a  few  mo- 
ments later  they  were  drifting  past  just  overhead, 
and  there,  far  below  us,  stretched  the  deep, 
crooked  valley  of  Sorata. 

It  was  the  very  heart  of  the  Andes.  In  the 
wedge-shaped  channel  of  the  tortuous  valley  a 
slender  thread  of  white  torrent  narrowed  and 
disappeared  in  the  haze  of  depth  and  distance; 
the  huge  mountains  swept  upward  like  the  sides 
of  a  great  bowl,  while  delicately  floating  strata 
of  fleecy  clouds  seemed  to  mark  off  and  measure 
and  then  accent  their  enormous  altitudes.  Be- 
yond and  above  them  rose  other  peaks  and  the 
jagged  fangs  of  interlocking  mountain-ranges 
that  formed  this  colossal  Andean  maze;  there 
was  no  sense  of  distance;  even  the  feeling  of 
space  seemed  to  be  for  the  instant  gone,  and  un- 


136  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

der  the  long,  mellow  rays  of  the  afternoon  sun, 
with  this  vast,  shattered  universe  spread  before 
us,  it  was  as  though  we  had  been  suddenly  trans- 
lated and  left  dizzy  and  bewildered  in  an  opales- 
cent infinity. 

The  Aymara  huts  that  clung  to  the  steep 
slopes  with  their  little  patches  of  corn  were 
shrunk  to  miniature;  the  single  bull  plowing 
with  a  crooked  tree-trunk  was  a  diminutive  bug, 
prodded  along  the  furrow  by  a  microscopic  in- 
sect. All  the  air  was  filled  with  the  low  roar 
of  cascades ;  every  slope  and  valley  was  scarred 
with  the  slender,  white  threads  of  torrents  from 
the  melting  snows  above.  Far  ahead,  where  the 
buttress  of  a  mountain  projected  like  a  hilly 
peninsula  into  the  Sorata  valley,  a  toy  village  of 
scarlet  tile  and  thatched  roofs  was  compactly 
lodged  on  the  flattened  crest.  It  was  the  village 
of  Sorata,  clinging  like  a  lichen  to  a  spur  of  the 
huge,  overhanging  mountain  from  which  it 
takes  its  name. 

Late  in  the  afternoon,  although  the  gorge  had 
long  since  been  cool  in  the  shadows  of  the  inclos- 
ing mountains,  we  crossed  the  old  Spanish  stone 
bridge  that  still  spans  the  torrent  of  melted 
snows,  where  an  ancient  mill  remains  to  testify 


OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    137 

to  the  enterprise  of  the  early  Spanish  adventur- 
ers. A  short  climb  up  the  steep  promontory  to 
the  village,  and  we  clattered  over  the  paved 
streets  and  on  into  the  patio  of  the  sole  posada, 
the  old  bell-mule  leader  trotting  in  with  the  easy 
familiarity  of  many  previous  trips. 

The  proprietress,  a  plump  Cholo  lady,  made 
still  plumper  by  the  many  skirts  of  her  class,  all 
worn  at  once,  so  that  she  swayed  and  undulated 
like  an  antebellum  coquette,  fluttered  about  in 
welcome.  Her  pink  stockinged  legs — the  skirts 
come  just  below  the  knees — and  fancy  slashed 
satin  shoes,  with  the  highest  of  high  French 
heels,  teetered  about  the  patio  and  over  the 
rough  floors,  giving  orders  to  a  drunken  Aymara 
cook  and  a  small  Aymara  boy,  who  proved  to  be 
the  chambermaid.  Gracefully  she  joined  in  a 
bottle  of  stinging  Chilean  wine  and  bawled  fur- 
ther orders  for  our  comfort  out  into  the  shuffling 
kitchen.  At  supper  we  had  soup — chicken  soup, 
with  the  head  and  feet  floating  with  the  chalona 
and  chuno.  There  followed  a  kind  of  melon, 
scooped  out  and  loaded  with  raisins  and  scraps 
of  pork  and  whatever  other  scraps  and  vegetables 
were  at  hand,  blistered  with  a]i,  the  fiercest  and 
most  venomous  pepper  known  to  man. 


138 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


A  real  lamp  and 
some  f  lowe  r  s 
graced  the  bare 
table  and,  after  the 
filthy  mud  huts  and 
smoke-impregnated 
tambos,  with  their 
acrid  smoke  in- 
grained in  the  walls 
and  thatch,  the 
tinned  food 
warmed  by  the  fu- 
tile flame  of  an  al- 
cohol lamp,  this  po- 
sada  glowed  with  a  gaiety  and  cheer  that 
could  not  be  duplicated.  Damask  and  cut  glass 
could  have  added  nothing  to  the  table ;  even  the 
smelly  lamp  glowed  with  a  seductive  radiance 
in  the  balmy  atmosphere,  and  reminded  us,  by 
contrast,  of  the  tallow  candles  on  the  plateau 
above,  where  the  icy  wind  blew  them  to  a  thin 
spark  of  incandescence. 

Here  it  was  necessary  to  stop  and  rest  the 
mules  for  the  second  and  hardest  stage  of  the 
journey  over  this  Andean  pass.  Besides,  with 
the  more  difficult  trail  ahead  the  loads  of  the 


SOI^DERING   THE    FOOD    IN    TIN    CANS. 


OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    139 

mules  must  be  lessened.  More  mules  were 
needed,  and  more  supplies — the  staples — corn, 
chalona,  chuno,  and  rice,  and  those  to  be  sold- 
ered in  tin  cans  where  the  storms  of  the  moun- 
tains and  the  rapids  in  the  canons  of  the  interior 
could  not  spoil  them.  Rodriguez  pastured  the 
outfit  somewhere  up  the  valley  until  it  was  again 
ready;  then  one  day  the  arrieros  were  busy 
weighing  the  packs,  balancing  them  and  lashing 
them  in  the  nets  of  rawhide  for  the  easier  pack- 
ing and  adjustment. 

Again  it  was  in  the  pitch  blackness  that  pre- 
cedes the  break  of  day  that  we  climbed  into  the 
saddles  for  the  long  pull  over  this  highest  and 
hardest  pass  that  leads  into  the  great  tropical 
basin,  the  heart  of  South  America.  Salmon,  a 
huge  black  who  had  drifted  in  from  Jamaica 
and  who  baked  Sorata  bread  and  attracted  the 
Aymara  custom  in  the  plaza  on  fiestas  by  whirl- 
ing in  a  grotesque  dance  of  his  own  devising, 
shuffled  down  the  steep  street  from  his  oven  to 
see  us  off.  The  huge  muscles  of  his  half-naked 
body  rippled  in  massive  shadows  in  the  fading 
darkness;  heavy  silver  rings  dangled  from  his 
ears  against  the  black,  bull  neck  and  matched 
the  brass  and  silver  with  which  his  fingers  were 
loaded. 


140  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

He  spoke  no  connected  language,  for  his  wan- 
dering had  left  him  with  a  scanty  and  combined 
vocabulary  of  English,  Spanish,  Caribbean 
French  patois,  and  a  sprinkling  of  Aymara. 
He  was  nothing  more  than  a  pattering  savage,  al- 
though never  for  an  instant  did  he  forsake  the 
proud  dignity  of  his  British  citizenship.  Once, 
as  a  gift,  he  prepared  for  us  a  salad ;  but  as  there 
was  no  oil  to  be  had  in  Sorata,  with  sublime  un- 
selfishness he  dedicated  one  of  his  own  bottles  of 
heavily  scented  hair-oil  to  the  salad  dressing  1 

He  stuffed  a  bottle  of  atrocious  brandy  into 
my  saddle-bag,  and  added  a  pious  "  Lord  bless 
ye,  sar!  "  for  he  was  a  Methodist,  and  on  Sunday 
afternoons,  in  support  of  his  orthodoxy,  ap- 
peared in  the  plaza  loaded  down  with  massive 
silver  ornament,  a  frock-coat,  a  battered  silk  hat 
balanced  on  his  shaven,  bullet-head,  a  heavy,  sil- 
ver-studded stick,  and  a  black  volume  under  his 
arm.  As  there  was  no  chapel,  this  illusive 
church  stroll  was  purely  a  surviving  symbolism. 

The  jam  of  pack  animals  in  the  narrow  street 
straightened  out  under  the  stimulus  of  the  ar- 
rieros'  rawhide  thongs  and  we  clattered  by  the 
little  plaza  and  on  up  a  narrow,  rain-washed 
gully  flanked  with  the  thatched  mud  huts  of  the 
Aymaras,  on  past  the  walled  cemetery  and  into 


OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    141 

the   steep   trail    that   led    up    the 
mountains.     High    above    us    the 
peaks    were    still    hidden  in    soft 
masses  of  clouds  that  were  already 
golden  under  the  first  rays  of  the 
morning  sun.     The   trail  wound 
in  and  out,   fol- 
lowing the  trace  ^'^^ 
of  the  steep  foot-       ji^^^^    ^-^  \ 
hills  that    b 


SCATTERED    IN    HYSTERICAI,    FLIGHT    UP   AND    DOWN    THE    PRECIPI- 
TOUS   SLOPES. 

tress  Mount  Sorata,  but  always  rising,  sometimes 
abruptly,  and  then  again  in  a  series  of  steadily 
ascending  dips  along  a  succession  of  narrow 
ledges. 


142  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

On  one  of  these  nar- 
row    ledges     we     came 
around  a  corner  suddenly 
on  a  large  pack-train  of 
X  llamas    and    on    the  in- 
J  stant    they    scattered    in 
y    hysterical  fright  up  and 
down    the    precipitous 
,,  V     slopes  with  the  sure-foot- 
<^^^    edness  of  mountain-goats. 
\  An  hour  later  we  could 
A     ^  /  still    see    their    Aymara 
■0>,     drivers,    far    below    us, 
crawling  over  the  slopes 
with   the  slings    hurling 
pebbles     at    the    stupid 
beasts  in  their  efforts  to 
V  "^^  collect  them  on  the  trail. 
^^^      Rapidly  the  semi- 
tropical    vegetation    that 
flourished   in   the    lower 
altitude  of  the  village  of 
S  o  ra  ta      disappeared; 
more  rugged  and  hardier 
SKIRTED  THE  BASE  OF  AN  UN-  shrubs     succccdcd,     and 
BROKEN  CUFF.  thcse,  too,  in  their  turn 


OVER  THE  FIRST  GREAT  PASS    143 

disappeared  and  nothing  was  left  but  the  storm 
scarred  patches  of  high  pasture.  Above  these 
the  wet,  black  rocks  of  the  Andes  thrust  their 
jagged  masses  into  the  air  in  sullen  cliffs  sur- 
mounted by  snow-capped  minarets  and  pin- 
nacles. Only  once  I  saw  a  condor,  for  they  are 
not  common,  sailing  lazily  a  couple  of  hundred 
feet  below  us.  It  was  a  distinct  disappoint- 
ment. The  white  puff  of  downy  feathers  about 
the  neck  identified  it,  but  amid  these  impressive 
surroundings  it  seemed  no  more  than  a  sparrow 
flitting  about  in  a  down-town  city  street. 

For  miles  we  skirted  the  base  of  an  unbroken 
cliff  that  rose  three  hundred  feet  sheer  from  the 
trail,  and  then  suddenly  came  upon  a  ragged 
break  in  the  wall  that  accommodatingly  opened 
a  passage  where  the  trail  climbed  to  meet  it. 
The  narrow  passageway  was  as  dim  as  the  dusk 
of  evening;  it  zigzagged  through  the  cliff  in  a 
series  of  high  steps  cut  or  worn  in  the  rock;  the 
high  walls  on  each  side  and  its  tortuous  turnings 
shut  out  all  light  except  such  as  fell  from  the 
illuminated  strip  of  sky  above.  Here  and  there 
tumbled  walls  of  stones  suggested  the  possibility 
of  ancient  barricades,  and  no  more  weird  a  set- 
ting could  be  devised  to  set  a  fanciful  adventure 
afloat  in  fiction. 


144  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

That  night  we  made  camp  in  the  open  in  a 
little  gorge,  and  sheltered  ourselves  in  the  lee  of 
an  enormous  boulder.  The  packs  were  piled  in 
a  wall,  and  over  this  the  tent  was  thrown  and 
held  down  by  heavy  stones.  A  blinding  snow- 
squall  roared  through  the  narrow  gorge  as 
through  a  pipe;  later  it  changed  to  a  stinging 
blizzard,  where  the  tiny  particles  of  ice  stung 
like  a  sand-blast.  There  was  no  fuel  for  a  fire, 
and  only  by  carefully  barricading  the  alcohol 
lamp  could  a  little  thin  tea  be  warmed.  That, 
together  with  cold  tinned  things  and  a  nip  of 
Salmon's  effective  brandy  made  shift  for  dinner. 

The  tough  little  mules,  hobbled  and  turned 
out  to  graze  among  the  shale  and  thin,  snow- 
covered  grass,  made  no  effort  to  seek  a  lee 
shelter  and  wandered  about,  indifferent  to  the 
gale.  An  Aymara  family,  driving  a  few  burros 
packed  with  rubber,  spent  the  night  in  the  lee 
of  a  small,  overhanging  rock.  There  was  a 
baby  not  two  years  old  in  the  family,  yet,  with- 
out a  fire  and  with  nothing  but  raw  chalona, 
they  made  their  customary  camp.  Their  heads 
were  heavily  muffled  as  usual,  but  the  dawn 
found  their  bare  legs  drifted  over  with  five 
inches  of  snow,  and  apparently  comfortable  and 
indifferent  to  the  fact. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI 

PACKING  the  mules  in  the  bitter  winter 
dawn  was  slow  work.  The  rawhide  lash- 
ings were  frozen  stiff;  our  saddles  were 
covered  with  sleet,  before  we  could  mount 
and  swing  into  them;  two  arrieros  were  drunk 
together  with  Agamemnon,  but  the  latter  alone 
was  helpless  and  useless  after  the  tender  care 
he  had  bestowed  on  a  secreted  bottle  of  alcohol. 
His  usual  chocolate  grin  was  lost  in  the  agonies 
of  "  de  mis'ry  in  de  haid,  sar,"  and,  utterly  de- 
jected, he  rode  along  with  his  wooly  skull  naked 
to  the  sleet  and  with  an  ice-coated  sock  as  a 
bandage  to  keep  it  within  the  normal  circum- 
ference. 

Whatever  course  the  trail  turned,  the  bliz- 
zard seemed  to  shift  to  meet  us  again  square  in 
the  teeth.  The  shale  and  debris  along  the  nar- 
row ledge  of  trail  was  treacherous  with  an  icy 

145 


146 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


glare.     The  saddle  buckles  were  knots  of  ice, 
and  every  now  and  then  we  beat  our  hats  against 


ANDEAN    MOUNTAINEER. 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       147 

the  mule  to  break  the  ice  that  encrusted  them; 
on  my  poncho  the  sleet  froze  in  a  thin  sheet  that 
would  crackle  with  any  movement  and  rattle  off. 
The  particles  of  ice  and  snow  did  not  fall  as  in 
a  self-respecting  gale,  but  were  whipped  along 
in  the  blast  in  streaks  that  never  seemed  to  drop. 
In  the  high,  thin  air,  the  bitter  cold  of  the  storm 
seemed  to  bite  like  an  acid.  Even  though  the 
mules  were  mountain-bred,  the  rare  air  of  this 
high  pass  affected  them  and  as  we  climbed 
higher,  they  began  to  halt  every  fifty  yards  for 
breath,  with  their  icicled  flanks  heaving  in  dis- 
tress. In  a  moment  they  would  start  on  again 
of  their  own  accord,  yet  sometimes  in  the  fiercer 
blasts  of  the  storm  only  the  constant  spur  would 
keep  them  in  the  trail  and  headed  for  the  pass 
above. 

At  last  there  was  the  feel  of  a  level  stretch 
under  hoof,  and  there  loomed  the  big  mound  of 
stones,  with  a  twig  cross  on  top  and  its  strips  of 
calico  whipped  to  shreds;  the  summit  of  the 
pass  had  been  reached.  The  small  house-build- 
ers' altars  at  the  base  were  drifted  over  with 
snow;  a  few  twig  crosses  sticking  out  of  the 
snow  marked  the  Aymara  graves  of  some  who 
had  been  of  mark  among  their  people,  for  it  is 


148  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

a  great  and  desirable  honor  to  be  buried  high 
up  among  the  mountain  gods.  The  lesser 
Aymaras,  dying  on  the  trail,  are  left,  or  rolled 
over  a  convenient  steep  slope.  In  the  lee  of  the 
stone  cairn  a  solitary  Aymara  was  resting;  his 
coarse,  woolen  trousers  rolled  above  his  knees, 
his  feet  bare.  His  eyes  grinned  at  us  from  out 
the  poncho  mufflings,  and  I  recognized  him  as 
a  little  Indian  who  was  picked  out  to  carry  for  us 
a  long  cross-cut  saw  that  was  too  awkward  to  be 
lashed  on  a  mule.  He  dug  the  saw  out  of  a 
drift  to  show  us  that  it  was  still  safe,  and  for  less 
than  two  dollars  he  delivered  the  saw  after  a 
six-days'  journey  across  the  pass  and  into 
Mapiri,  his  only  equipment  for  the  trip  being  a 
small  bag  of  parched  corn,  a  chalona  rib,  and 
the  invariable  pouch  of  coca. 

Late  in  the  afternoon  we  rode  into  the 
Aymara  village  of  Yngenio.  There  had  been 
but  a  slight  drop  since  leaving  the  summit  and 
the  rocky  pocket  in  which  the  village  exists  was 
covered  with  a  light  snow.  The  Aymaras  here 
are  miners  and  looked  with  unfavoring  eyes  on 
the  outfits  passing  through.  There  was  an 
empty  house  of  dry-laid  stones  with  a  tattered 
roof  of  blackened  thatch  that  was  used  as  a  pub- 


There  Loomed  the  Big  Mound  of  Stones,  with  a  Twig 
Cross  on  Top 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       149 

lie  shelter  by  any  passing  party,  and  a  walled 
corral  into  which  the  mules  were  driven. 

In  this  village  the  huts  were  chiefly  of  stone 
chinked  with  mud  and  grass;  some  even  rose  to 
the  dignity  of  two  stories  with  a  rough  ladder 
leading  above.  Three  mountain  torrents  joined 
in  this  gulch  to  form  the  Yngenio  River.  The 
Aymaras  bed  these  torrents  with  flat  stones  in 
the  dry  season  and  after  the  next  high  water  has 
passed,  wash  the  fresh  gold  brought  down  in 
their  wooden  pans.  But  all  about  were  the 
ruins  of  elaborate  ancient  gold  workings  that 
indicated  that  this  was  one  of  the  centers  from 
which  the  Incas  drew  their  enormous  golden 
treasure.  All  along  the  gulch  as  we  rode  in 
there  were  the  broken  openings  of  tunnels  and 
drifts  high  up  on  the  mountain-sides.  Some 
had  been  concealed  by  walling  up  and  this  had 
been  torn  away  by  some  later  Spanish  prospector 
or  had  tumbled  in  during  the  course  of  time. 

There  were  the  remains  of  a  great  flume  and 
of  the  stone-laid  troughs  where  the  streams  were 
diverted  and  laid  their  nuggets  in  the  crude  rif- 
fles— even  as  they  still  do  in  other  Aymara  work- 
ings. Near  the  junction  of  the  three  torrents 
there  was  an  immense  rectangular  pile  of  care- 


I50  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

fully  laid  stones,  with  carefully  constructed 
ramps  leading  from  one  level  to  the  next. 
Throughout  this  district  there  were  also  many 
little,  low,  round  stone  huts  that  reminded  one 
forcibly  of  the  Esquimaux  igloo;  they  were  of 
great  age,  their  arches  had  fallen  in,  and  the 
stones  were  black  with  the  centuries  of  aging. 

The  present  day  Aymaras  raise  a  little  corn 
and  potatoes  for  chuno,  some  sheep  for  chalona, 
while  a  few  muscular  pigs  make  the  razor-back 
seem  fat  by  comparison.  The  arrieros  foraged 
among  the  huts  for  cebada  for  the  mules  and  a 
chicken  or  some  eggs  for  us,  but  the  Aymaras 
either  had  none  or  else  surlily  refused  to  sell, 
but  there  was  fuel  and  with  that  a  fine  hot  tinned 
dinner  was  prepared. 

The  following  day  the  pack-mules  filed  from 
one  hog-back  mountain  ridge  to  another,  crawl- 
ing up  the  steep  ascents  or  gingerly  picking 
their  way  downward  over  an  intricate  system  of 
connecting  mountain  series.  Hour  after  hour 
the  bitter  winds  blew  without  rest.  At  times  we 
would  be  a  long  column  on  some  ridge  that 
dropped  away  on  either  side  in  a  steep  declivity; 
the  great  depths,  whenever  they  became  visible 
through  a  rift  in  the  clouds  below,  gave  the 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       15 ii 

valleys  beneath  the  blue  haze  of  distance,  while 
a  glass  revealed  the  heavy  vegetation,  the  palms, 
and  the  mellow  glow  of  warm  sunlight.  Far- 
ther on  the  trail  would  cling,  a  mere  ledge,  to 
the  side  of  cliffs  where  the  melted  snow,  drip- 
ping from  the  stirrup,  would  fall  a  couple  of 
hundred  feet  sheer. 

On  the  narrow  ledges  of  the  trail  there  were 
the  most  abrupt  turns  and  sharp  angles  and  often 
a  rough  series  of  steps  up  which  the  mules  would 
clamber  in  plunging  jumps.  There  was  no  dan- 
ger as  long  as  one  put  faith  in  the  mule  and  did 
not  attempt  to  over-balance  him  by  leaning  too 
far  to  the  cliff;  those  sure-footed  animals  have 
no  desire  to  kill  themselves  or  slip  carelessly  and 
they  may  be  implicitly  depended  upon.  In  one 
particularly  bad  descent  known  as  the  "  Tor- 
nillo  "  no  one  rode  down.  It  was  a  zigzag  trail 
apparently  cut  in  the  face  of  an  almost  per- 
pendicular cliff,  and  the  arrieros  took  the  pack- 
train  down  in  sections,  so  that,  in  the  event  of 
one  mule  stumbling,  it  would  not  bump  half 
the  others  over  the  edge. 

Just  beyond  the  "  Tornlllo  "  we  passed  a  llama 
train.  One  of  the  Aymaras  came  toward  us,  one 
arm  supporting  the  other  at  the  wrist  and  his 


152  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

face  drawn  with  pain  and  fright,  chiefly  fright, 
out  of  all  proportion  to  the  simple  sprain.  He 
stopped  uncertainly,  a  short  distance  off,  and  re- 
peated, "Tata!  Tata!"  over  and  over,  plain- 
tively pointing  to  his  injured  wrist.  It  was  a 
simple  matter  to  bind  it  up  and  throw  in  a  few 
impressive  and  magic  gestures,  and  with  a  dis- 
tinctly beneficial  effect,  for  he  began  to  grin 
cheerfully.  The  pain  was  nothing;  it  was  the 
fact  that  he  had  fallen  that  had  worried  him. 
The  Aymara,  as  sure-footed  as  a  goat  or  one  of 
his  own  llamas,  a  mountaineer  by  birth,  is  wor- 
ried when  he  stumbles  and  falls ;  it  is  one  of  the 
very  local  gods  clutching  at  him,  and  every  one 
knows  the  powerlessness  of  a  mere  mortal  when 
a  god  gets  after  him. 

Months  later,  in  a  little  interior  village  in  the 
montafia,  I  met  this  same  Aymara.  He  came 
forward  grinning  and  beaming  and  then,  about 
ten  feet  off,  shuffled  from  one  foot  to  the  other 
in  respectful  and  embarrassed  gratitude.  Evi- 
dently the  magic  gestures  had  done  their  work 
well  and  had  so  far  frustrated  the  peevish  god 
who  had  been  after  him.  In  bandaging  him  my 
hand  had  slipped  over  the  muscles  of  the  arm 
and,   although  they  lay  without  tension,   they 


I 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       153 

were  like  bundles  of  steel  cables ;  in  that  stubby, 
squat  figure  lay  the  strength  of  a  gorilla.  In 
La  Paz  I  had  seen  the  Aymara  cargadores  walk 
off  with  three  hundred  pounds  of  flour — some- 
times more, — and  carry  it  with  ease  half  a  mile 
in  that  rarified  atmosphere.  Another  time,  at 
Guaqui,  a  cargadore  picked  up  with  his  shoul- 
der rope  a  piano  in  its  case,  and  carried  it  across 
the  tracks  of  the  railroad  yard. 

That  night  we  camped  in  a  tiny  stone  hut  built 
by  the  government  on  a  high,  mountain  promon- 
tory where  the  clearest  weather  known  is  a  dull, 
depressing,  drizzling  rain.  An  outfit  of  Ay- 
maras  were  already  crowded  in  and  Rodriguez 
hustled  them  out  again,  in  fact,  they  were  al- 
ready packing  up  their  scanty  outfit  preparing 
to  move  when  they  saw  the  mules  coming.  Out- 
side in  the  mud,  there  were  the  remnants  of  a 
human  skeleton,  picked  clean  by  the  eagles  and 
tramped  carelessly  in  the  mud.  The  skull  hung 
from  a  stick  jammed  into  the  wall  of  the  hut. 

"  Aymara!  "  remarked  Rodriguez  contemptu- 
ously,as  he  pried  it  out  and  tossed  it  over  into 
the  canon  below.  That  was  his  delicate  tribute 
to  the  sensitiveness  of  the  gringoes  who,  he  thinks 
may  not  fancy  a  skull  as  a  wall  ornament. 


154  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

With  this  camp,  the  last  of  the  high  pass  was 
over  and  in  the  gray  dawn  we  began  the  long 
descent  out  of  the  clouds,  the  sleet,  the  snow,  and 
the  bitter  rains.  The  bare  clififs  and  slopes  gave 
way,  and  stunted  shrubs  appeared  now  and  then 
even  a  gaunt  tree  reared  itself,  and,  perched  on 
a  dead  branch,  an  occasional  buzzard  or  eagle 
looked  with  a  speculative  eye  at  the  mules  and 
the  steep  descents.  We  dropped  through  long 
distances  of  sunlight  that  glowed  with  a  grateful 
and  novel  warmth,  and  once  in  a  while  a  brilliant 
little  bird  flashed  past,  while  gorgeous  butter- 
flics  began  to  flutter  about  the  mud-holes.  The 
eastern  side  of  the  Andes  drop  in  a  succession  of 
forest-clad  cliffs ;  looking  up  and  back,  it  seemed 
at  times  hardly  possible  that  a  trail  could  cling 
to  the  steep  face.  Many  of  the  hardest  have 
names — Amargarani,  the  "  hill  of  bitterness  " — 
Cayatana-y-huata,  the  ^'  place  where  Cayatana 
fell  "  are  directly  suggestive. 

There  is  no  more  telling  strain  than  leaning 
back  hour  upon  hour  as  the  mule  picks  his  way 
downward,  but  it  is  forgotten  in  the  relief  of 
basking  in  the  mellow  rays  of  the  long  afternoon 
sun,  and  it  was  grateful  that  night  to  be  able 
to  undress  in  place  of  turning  in  "  all  standing," 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       155 

except  for  spurs,  and  in  place  of  the  howling 
gale  and  the  snow  that  sifted  through  the  crev- 
ices, to  hear  the  soft  rustling  of  the  night-blown 
palms.  An  open-work  hut  of  split  palm  and 
cane  was  kept  here  by  a  Bolivian  who  was  under 
some  kind  of  vague  government  subsidy,  and  un- 
der his  palm  roof  we  slung  our  hammocks. 

His  Aymara  wife  was  stolidly  indifferent  to 
our  presence,  but  a  little  daughter — a  mere  baby 
she  would  be  considered  back  in  the  States — had 
an  unbounded  curiosity  in  the  white  men — white 
men  especially  who  wore  queer,  transparent 
stones  set  in  glittering  frames  before  their  nat- 
ural eyes.  A  watch  was  even  more  mysterious, 
"Ah,"  she  announced,  "  there  is  a  bug  inside! " 
Following  the  matter  up,  she  decided  that  the 
watch  was  a  bug  itself  and  marveled  greatly 
that  a  full-grown  man  should  bother  to  carry  a 
bug  about  on  the  end  of  a  little  string,  unless — 
aha!  it  was  a  magic,  and  she  dropped  the  watch, 
nor  would  she  touch  it  again.  Thereat  she 
showed  me  a  scapular  and  offered  to  take  me 
up  the  trail  a  bit  where  there  were  some  graves 
and  I  could  see  some  ghosts,  and  perhaps  talk 
with  them,  as  she  did.  Not  among  any  of  the 
Aymaras  was  I  ever  able  to  notice  any  particular 


156  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

interest  or  fear  in  regard  to  their  dead.  Their 
trails  are  scattered  with  graves  and  mountain 
tragedies,  they  believe  in  spirits,  but  the  almost 
universal  fear  of  ghosts,  dead  spirits,  or  ceme- 
teries after  dark  is  apparently  lacking.  In  fact, 
in  Sorata,  it  was  no  common  thing  to  hear  them 
drinking  and  celebrating  under  the  cemetery 
walls  far  into  the  late  hours. 

Pleasantly  from  here  the  rest  of  the  trail  ran 
on  down  into  Mapiri.  The  giant  foothills  of  the 
Andes  surrounded  us,  but  they  were  covered 
with  forest  and  jungle,  and  for  miles  we  would 
ride  in  the  cool  shade  where  the  trees  were 
matted  overhead  by  the  interlocking  jungle- 
vines.  Little  trails  opened  off  now  and  again 
from  the  main  road,  and  often  would  be  seen 
the  cane  hut  of  some  pioneer.  Down  the  valleys 
were  patches  of  sugar-cane,  with  the  smoke  of  a 
falca,  alcohol-still,  rising  close  by,  and  as  we 
rode  closer,  the  smell  of  burned  sugar  where 
chancaca,  something  like  maple-sugar  in  appear- 
ance, was  being  poured  into  molds  gouged  out 
of  a  dry  log. 

Occasionally,  in  the  forest,  a  thin  column  of 
blue  smoke  showed  where  some  rubber-picker 
was  smoking  his  morning's  collection  of  rubber 


THE  TOLL  GATE  AND  MAPIRI       157 

milk.  On  all  this  the  sun  beat  with  its  full, 
tropical  strength,  and  the  raw  fogs  and  blizzards 
of  the  high  pass  seemed  to  be  months  behind  us. 
Coffee,  tea,  and  tinned  things,  but  now  comfort- 
ably warmed  or  gratefully  cool,  were  served 
alongside  the  trail  at  the  brief  noon-day  halt  and 
what  was  left  of  a  bunch  of  bananas  cut  from  the 
patch  in  the  camp  of  the  previous  night  added 
the  final  touch.  In  the  cool  of  the  early  evening 
we  rode  into  the  village  of  Mapiri,  and  the  sad- 
dles were  taken  off  and  oiled  and  packed  for  the 
last  time.  From  here  on  the  journey  would  be 
by  raft  and  batalon  on  the  rivers.  The  moun- 
tain trail  was  ended. 

The  village  has  a  long,  grass-grown  plaza  on 
two  sides;  toward  the  muddy  Mapiri  River  the 
plaza  is  open,  and  the  entering  end  is  blocked  by 
a  mud  church  with  a  mud-walled  yard,  loop- 
holed  and  battlemented.  Once  a  year  a  priest 
makes  the  trip  to  Mapiri  and  down  the  river, 
performing  his  offices  as  they  are  needed.  He 
blesses  the  graves  of  the  dead,  christens  the  liv- 
ing, and  performs  canonical  marriages  for  those 
who  desire,  and  can  afford,  the  luxury. 

A  squat  Cholo  welcomed  us ;  he  was  the  head 
man  of  the  settlement  and  gave  us  one  of  his 


158  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

houses  for  our  headquarters.  While  he  talked 
with  us,  a  monkey  climbed  up  his  leg  and  coiled 
its  tail  affectionately  about  his  neck.  A  pink- 
faced  little  marmoset,  with  a  black-tipped  tail, 
overcame  his  first  nervousness  and  chattered  at 
us  from  the  refuge  of  the  eaves,  while  a  thin, 
waving  spider-monkey  cooed  with  weird,  sprawl- 
ing gestures  at  the  end  of  his  tether,  and  from 
the  high,  peaked  roof  a  dozen  parrots  shrieked 
their  evening  songs  to  the  sunset.  The  Cholo's 
wife,  a  thin,  shrewish  Aymara,  viewed  us  with 
disfavor;  for  days  she  refused  to  sell  us  eggs 
while  we  were  waiting  for  the  rafts  to  arrive, 
and  then  she  threw  away  five  dozen  that  had 
spoiled  on  her  hands.  When  her  Cholo  husband 
saw  this  lost  profit  he  said  nothing,  but  that  night 
sounds  that  suggested  a  primitive  family  disci- 
pline arose  in  his  household  and  pierced  the  little 
village. 


CHAPTER  XI 

WAITING  FOR  THE  LECCOS 

FOR  a  month  we  waited  in  this  tiny  strag- 
gling rectangle  of  thatched  huts  before  the 
balsas  or  callapos  could  get  up  to  us  to 
move  our  outfit  down  the  river.  Somewhere 
below  us  on  the  turbulent  river  Lecco  crews 
were  toiling  up  against  the  current,  dragging 
and  clawing  their  way  through  narrow  canons, 
hanging  fast  in  places  to  the  bare  rock,  and  again 
helped  by  the  long,  tropical  vines  that  drooped 
to  the  swift  water.  Twice  they  had  been  beaten 
back  by  sudden  rises  in  the  river;  the  third  time 
they  got  through,  although  two  balsas  had  been 
wrecked  and  for  the  past  two  days  they  had  lived 
mainly  on  the  berries  and  leaves  along  the  jungle 
banks. 

A  splendid  lot  of  half-civilized  people,  tre- 
mendous of  muscle  and  capable  of  prodigous 
feats  of  strength  and  endurance  on  their  rivers; 

159 


i6o  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

ashore  sober  and  diffident,  afloat  on  their  rafts, 
by  right  of  an  immemorial  custom  they  are  al- 
ways drunk  and  serenely  confident  in  their  in- 
tuitive skill. 

For  twenty-four  hours  after  they  arrived  on 
the  hot  stone  beach  below  the  bluff  on  which 
Mapiri  lived  they  drank  and  feasted  and  slept 
and  then  their  head  man,  a  Bolivian  refugee,  an- 
nounced that  all  was  in  readiness.  The  gang  of 
workmen  we  had  chartered  were  collected  and 
counted  and  then  assigned  to  the  three  callapos, 
a  queer  lot,  but  in  the  main  fairly  promising  for 
our  purposes. 

One  was  a  negro  who  had  been  a  rubber  picker 
down  the  river  before.  During  his  absence  his 
wife  had  left  him  preferring  a  gentleman  of 
lighter  color,  but  who  had  only  one  eye;  some 
frontier  mechanic  had  hammered  a  patch  out 
of  a  silver  coin  and  then  engraved  with  a  nail 
the  ragged  outlines  of  an  eye,  which  the  owner 
proudly  wore  as  a  most  elegant  makeshift.  Both 
of  these  gentlemen  were  in  the  outfit  and  ordi- 
narily both  would  boast  in  the  utmost  good  na- 
ture of  their  fascinations  with  the  ladies — except 
when  they  were  in  process  of  getting  drunk. 
And  on  the  Bolivian  frontier  getting  drunk  is  rec- 


WAITING   FOR    THE   LECCOS      i6i 

ognized  as  a  perfectly  legitimate  pastime. 
There  are  no  games,  no  concerted  forms  of 
amusement,  the  montana  offers  nothing  except 
these  little  gatherings  with  some  childish  hop- 
ping as  a  dance  and  then  the  tin  cans  of  canassa 
and  the  ensuing  drunkenness. 

There  was  another  man  in  the  gang,  a  stocky, 
loose-jointed  fellow,  Segorrondo,  who  was  never 
sober,  except  during  his  working  hours,  but  dur- 
ing that  time  he  was  worth  any  two  of  the  other 
men — and  he  never  failed  to  turn  up  sober  for 
that  allotted  period.  His  capacity  was  nothing; 
three  times  in  one  afternoon  in  Mapiri  he  was 
sober  and  drunk,  with  the  lines  of  demarcation 
startlingly  distinct.  He  rarely  joined  in  the  lit- 
tle hoppings  to  the  reed  whistle  with  his  face 
daubed  with  clay  or  charcoal  and  decorated  with 
bits  of  twigs  or  leaves,  yet  he  was  perfectly  soci- 
able and  never  dangerous.  Later,  in  the  estab- 
lished camp  down  the  river,  there  came  a  three 
day  fiesta  for  which  he  prepared  in  advance. 
There  was  a  falca — a  still  for  making  the  can- 
assa from  a  half-wild  sugar-cane — up  the  river, 
and  he  drove  his  bargain  before  the  fiesta  began. 
He  was,  for  the  sum  of  one  Boliviano — about 
half  a  dollar,  gold — to  be  allowed  to  drink  all  he 


i62  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

chose  during  the  three  days,  but  was  to  carry 
none  away. 

Long  before  dawn  on  the  first  day  he  was  at 
the  falca;  for  three  days  he  never  moved  from 
the  litter  of  crushed  sugar-cane,  lying  in  a  stupor 
from  which  he  only  roused  himself  to  reach  out 
shakily  for  a  tin  cup  of  warm  alcohol  as  it 
dripped  from  the  still-worm.  We  expected  a 
wreck  to  show  up,  but  on  the  morning  of  the 
fourth  day  he  returned,  grinning  cheerfully,  and 
worked  as  though  nothing  had  occurred. 

Also  there  was  Nosario,  a  stocky  boy  of  about 
twelve  or  fourteen,  who  had  been  added  as  gen- 
eral utility  around  the  cook  or  camp.  He  was 
worthless  and  it  later  developed  that  his  wife, 
a  Cholo  lady  of  some  thirty  or  forty  years,  had 
prodded  him  into  the  effort  in  order  to  add  to  her 
matrimonial  support. 

Agamemnon  viewed  the  whole  collection  with 
great  scorn.  "  These  yer  pipple  ain't  noways 
fitten,  ba's,"  he  would  remark.  The  other  darky 
was  included  in  his  disfavor. 

Agamemnon  always  swelled  with  pride  at  the 
thought  that  he  was  a  Britisher  by  birth — born 
in  Barbadoes — and  he  counted  Americans  as  be- 
ing too  subtly  differentiated  to  be  separated; 


WAITING  FOR   THE  LECCOS      163 

humbly  accepting  his  place  as  assigned  in  their 
eyes,  he  looked  down  with  scorn  on  these  sham- 
bling, good  natured  animals. 

During  the  four  weeks  of  delay  in  Mapiri 
we  had  seen  much  of  a  neighboring  rubber 
baron,  old  man  Violand,  whose  barraca  was  a 
half  day's  ride  over  the  steep  trails.  The  old 
man  was  as  typically  Teutonic  as  though  he  had 
but  just  pushed  his  mild,  blue-eyed  way  into  the 
jungle.  His  headquarters — a  square  of  palm- 
thatched  and  palm-walled  buildings —  was  self- 
sustaining  from  the  coarse  flour  that  a  row  of 
Indian  women  were  grinding  between  heavy 
stones  in  one  corner  of  the  patio  to  his  coffee  and 
also  a  superior  brand  of  canassa  distilled  in  a 
wooden  worm,  cooled  in  a  hollow  palm  log, 
which  really  had  the  flavor  of  a  fine  liqueur. 
He  had  been  the  chief  figure  in  a  couple  of  rub- 
ber wars  over  disputed  territory  with  his  nearest 
neighbor  some  thirty  miles  away  and  he  showed 
a  spattering  of  bullet  holes  in  every  room  of  his 
house  with  delighted  pride.  The  dispute  was  a 
trifle  complicated,  but  as  the  result,  his  opponent 
was  a  fugitive  from  Bolivia  while  Violand  him- 
self tiptoed  into  Sorata  or  occasionally  La  Paz 
with  some  caution. 


i64  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Often  during  the  month  we  rode  down  to  see 
him — he  would  have  had  us  stay  there  for  life. 
No  sooner  did  our  mules  round  the  shoulder  of 
the  hill  than  we  could  see  some  small  Indian 
boy  darting  off  with  the  news.  The  familiar 
figure  of  the  old  man  would  bulk  in  the  doorway 
to  confirm  the  news  and  then  his  voice  would  be- 
gin booming  out  orders;  chickens  squawked, 
sheep  blatted,  and  at  once  the  place  was  a  tur- 
moil of  pursuit.  From  an  outbuilding  would 
come  the  blue  smoke  of  fresh  fires  and  the  shrill 
clacking  of  the  well-grimed  Aymara  cook  sum- 
moning her  family  help.  Always  were  we 
greeted  thus  and  always  there  was  a  ready  crowd 
of  Indians  at  our  heels  on  the  crest  of  the  boom 
to  take  the  mules  when  we  arrived  and  feed 
and  water  or  put  them  up  for  the  night. 

The  formalities  over  or  properly  supervised, 
Violand  would  seat  himself  at  a  huge  table  with 
the  top  a  single  plank  of  solid  mahogany  three 
inches  thick  and  before  the  ingredients  for  a  gin 
cocktail.  At  his  elbow  a  tiny  little  girl,  one  of 
the  daughters  of  the  Aymara  cook,  took  her  posi- 
tion to  trot  out  for  anything  lacking  in  the  first 
array.  A  gin  cocktail  is  sugar,  Angostura  bit- 
ters, and  gin — and  I  have  seen  it  served  in  full 


WAITING  FOR   THE  LECCOS      165 

goblets.  All  the  rest  of  the  forenoon  the  host 
would  busy  himself  compounding  this.  It  made 
not  the  slightest  difference  whether  anyone  else 
in  the  party  joined  him  or  not,  genially  he  would 
attend  to  it  himself  in  little  sips  whose  cumula- 
tive effect  was  prodigious.  As  the  midday 
breakfast  hour  approached  he  would  roar  for 
pisco,  a  species  of  Peruvian  brandy,  and  then, 
as  the  little  Aymara  maiden  announced  the  final 
hour  of  nutrition,  champagne. 

And  then  the  dinner,  half  a  sheep,  or  a  whole 
pig  and  once  the  head  of  a  young  bullock  to 
whose  cooking  the  old  man  had  given  personal 
attention,  waddling  back  and  forth  from  the  ma- 
hogany table  to  the  cook  house  accompanied  by 
the  little  Aymara  girl  fluttering  in  a  state  of  ec- 
static excitement.  For  the  rest  there  were  the 
chickens  and  the  native  foods,  the  chalona  slowly 
simmered  for  a  day  to  make  it  taste  like  food, 
with  the  chuna  floating  in  it  like  so  many  old 
medicine  corks,  the  chickens,  the  platanos,  boiled 
green  and  pith-like  or  better  in  their  black,  melt- 
ing over-ripeness  and  to  be  eaten  with  a  spoon, 
baked  and  delicious,  native  bread  from  home 
made  flour,  and  imported  preserves  for  dessert. 
Also  there  was  champagne  and  whiskey  and 


i66  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

pisco  and  canassa  and  gin  cocktails  again  until 
in  final  triumph  a  little  beer — everything  luke- 
warm or  tepid  from  the  shallows  of  the  tropical 
brook. 

By  and  by  the  old  man  would  venture  on  a 
German  song  or  two  and  then  beckon  to  the  little 
beady-eyed  Aymara  girl;  off  she  would  dart  to 
return  with  a  couple  of  heavy  footed  Indian 
women.  The  host  would  rise — with  assistance 
— and  trolling  some  uncertain  song  march  off 
to  his  bedroom  to  doze.  And  the  rest  of  the  time 
would  be  spent  with  his  son  and  manager,  both 
fine,  pink  cheeked  young  Germans  who  looked 
after  affairs.  It  sounds  like  a  wassail,  though 
ias  a  matter  of  fact,  it  was  old  Violand  who  was 
the  chief  performer — he  was  an  old  man,  civili- 
zation was  far  away,  eight  days  to  La  Paz  over 
pass  and  plateaus  and  blizzard  and  after  that 
to  Germany — six  months  for  a  letter  and  an  an- 
swer! 

Later  he  would  reappear  suddenly,  generally 
clad  in  a  shrimp  pink  bath  gown,  a  patent,  Ger- 
man Emperor-moustache-shaper  over  his  mous- 
tache, and  groping  for  his  spectacles.  When 
they  were  found  he  once  more  settled  himself  for 
a  pleasant  time,  generally  having  to  go  through 


WAITING  FOR   THE   LECCOS      167 

a  second  search  for  a  key  so  that  another  bottle 
of  bitters  could  be  produced. 

The  morning  after,  he  would  appear,  fresh 
and  blue-eyed  and  solicitous. 

"  You  hef  a  goot  time — yes?  "  then  he  would 
chuckle  until  he  shook  in  ponderous  ripples  and 
go  on  in  Spanish,  "  I  do  not  remember  much — 
after  dinner — yesterday — a  good  dinner — yes? 
A  good  dinner  is  much  in  this  country  of  the 
black  gold — the  rubber — yes — we  drink  a  little 
for  the  digestion,  la,  la — yes.  Hoi,  mozo — "  the 
little  Indian  girl  clattered  inside  for  the  bottles 
— "  just  one  little  cocktail  before  the  saddle — 
yes?  "  His  face  would  beam  in  its  frame  of  thin 
whiskers  with  the  proudly  upstanding  German- 
emperor-moustaches  the  center  of  their  radia- 
tions. 

In  the  jungles  across  the  river  from  Mapifi 
was  another  rubber  barraca  in  which  a  Bolivian 
owner  held  court.  Every  morning  we  could  see 
a  dozen  thin  threads  of  blue  smoke  trickling 
above  the  forest  where  his  pickers  were  smoking 
their  morning  collection  of  rubber  milk.  Over 
there  the  canassa  was  always  on  draft  for  all  at 
all  times,  while  half  the  week  was  a  fiesta  and 
Sunday  a  brawling  bedlam. 


t68  across   the  ANDES 

Slowly  the  days  dragged  on  with  an  occasional 
rumor  of  the  progress  of  the  Leccos  and  the 
callapos.  Once,  as  much  to  furnish  a  variation 
as  anything  else,  I  routed  out  a  couple  of  jars 
of  mincemeat  and  ventured  on  some  pies.  An 
oven  was  heated,  a  big  clay  dome,  such  as  our 
great-great-grandmothers  used,  from  out  of 
which  the  fire  was  drawn  and  on  a  long  handled 
paddle  I  shoved  in  a  load  of  pies.  Almost  in- 
stantly they  browned  and  then  passed  to  a  crisp 
black  before  the  paddle  could  maneuver  them 
out  again.  The  native  population,  however,  ap- 
preciated them  highly.  It  was  small  loss  as  the 
manufacture  of  pie  crust  is  somewhat  of  an  un- 
dertaking— at  least  in  that  tropical  temperature. 
The  lard,  native  or  imported,  is  a  beautiful  am- 
ber liquid  that  is  bought  or  carried  in  bottles 
and  pours  with  no  more  deliberation  than  so 
much  water. 

A  little  later  a  general  fiesta  in  Mapiri  helped 
out  the  dull  waiting  a  little.  We  noticed  an  ex- 
tra number  of  candles  burning  before  the  altar 
in  the  little  mud-walled  church  and  for  some 
days  before  there  had  been  the  thrumming  of 
hollow-tree  drums  from  the  little  huts  of  the 
village.    The  night  before  the  great  day,  while 


WAITING  FOR    THE   LECCOS      169 

it  was  scarcely  dark,  the  big  drums  began  boom- 
ing with  a  typical  Indian  rhythm ;  from  the  line 
of  huts  came  the  droning  wail  of  the  guests  that 
rose  and  fell  in  fitful  bursts,  while  now  and  again 
a  straggling  line  of  drunken  Cholos,  men  and 
women,  in  a  weaving  single  file,  trotted  in  a  stag- 
gering hop  around  the  grass  grown  plaza. 
There  was  feasting  and  drinking  and  noise ;  from 
the  barraca  across  the  river  came  a  delegation  to 
lend  a  joyous  hand.  Toward  morning  it  died 
down,  slumbered  uneasily  during  the  forenoon, 
and  then  began  working  to  a  frenzy  of  excite- 
ment as  evening  approached. 

All  the  drums  had  been  concentrated  in  the 
church,  tallow  dips  lined  the  walls,  attached  by 
their  own  tallow  to  the  sun-baked  clay,  and  cast 
uncertain  masses  of  shifting  shadows  that  flick- 
ered in  the  hot  and  smoky  drafts;  overhead  a 
flood  of  bats  chittered  in  amazement  at  the  in- 
vasion of  their  domain.  On  one  side  of  the 
church  were  squatted  all  of  the  old  women  in 
Mapiri  with  dull,  cafiassa  bleared  eyes  and 
cheeks  distended  with  coca  leaves  hammering 
out  a  monotonous  rhythm  on  the  drums. 

Before  the  altar  and  facing  it  side  by  side  were 
two  lines  of  the  smaller  boys  with  the  tallest  at 


I70  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

the  front  and  then  shading  down  to  the  rear,  each 
naked  to  the  waist  but  for  some  cheap  necklaces 
of  gay  beads.  Each  had  a  forked  twig  like  those 
we  used  for  our  juvenile  sling-shots,  and  strung 
on  a  wire  or  twisted  bark  thread  that  connected 
the  forks  were  a  dozen  little  bits  of  flat  tin  ham- 
mered out  of  old  sardine  cans.  Like  castanets 
they  jiggled  the  forked  stick  in  rhythm  with  the 
drums  and  as  they  jiggled  shuffling  in  a  hopping, 
dancing  lock-step  in  single  file  up  to  the  altar, 
and  then  back  in  the  same  way  half  the  depth  of 
the  beaten  earth  floor.  As  one  file  advanced  the 
other  jiggled  back  and  so  on  alternately.  For 
hours  they  had  kept  it  up  and  there  was  no  sign 
of  either  a  stop  or  a  rest. 

The  rest  of  the  villagers  flitted  in  or  out  as 
ordinary  spectators,  still  nibbling  at  portions  of 
the  feast  or  sharing  a  continuously  filled  bottle 
of  canassa  with  the  drumming  old  women.  It 
was  not  until  daybreak  that  Mapiri  dropped  into 
an  exhausted  rest. 

During  this  fiesta  there  had  been  no  shooting 
of  dynamite — that  is  quarter  pound  sticks  with  a 
short  fuse  like  a  fire-cracker.  This  once  more 
popular  amusement  had  been  dampened  by  the 
last  really  important  fiesta  they  had  celebrated. 


WAITING  FOR   THE  LECCOS      171 

A  Cholo  gentleman  had,  it  seemed,  zigzagged 
out  into  the  grass  grown  plaza  with  his  stick  of 
dynamite,  lighted  it  from  his  cigarette,  and  then 
in  a  drunken  effort  to  throw  it  away  had  dropped 
it.  He  did  not  notice  this  trifling  difference  in 
his  program  and  swinging  dizzily  round  with  the 
effort  of  his  throw  fell  sprawling  upon  the  cart- 
ridge. His  demise  is  still  spoken  of  with  awe  on 
that  river.  Therefore  it  was  that  Mapiri  cele- 
brated a  quiet  fiesta. 

And  then  the  balsas  arrived.  Their  Lecco 
crew  gorged  and  slept  and  drank  for  a  day  and 
then  were  as  fresh  as  ever,  busy  in  lashing  each 
three  balsas  together  with  cross  logs  to  make  cal- 
lapos  for  the  down-stream  voyage.  Three  of 
these  callapos  we  had  and,  when  loaded  with 
their  freight,  crews  and  workmen  passengers, 
their  logs  were  four  inches  under  water,  the  little 
platforms  on  which  the  baggage  was  piled  and 
carefully  lashed,  rising  like  a  little  island  on 
stilts  above  the  current. 


CHAPTER  XII 


OFF  ON  THE  LONG  DRIFT 


Along  line  of  half-naked  Leccos  trotted 
across  the  grass-coverjsd  bluff  and  disap- 
peared over  the  edge  and  down  the  steep 
path  to  the  river,  where  our  clumsy  rafts  swung 
and  eddied  in  the  boiling  current.  They  grunted 
and  sweated  and  laughed  as  they  threw  the  heavy 
packages  of  our  outfit  on  their  shoulders,  for  they 
could  swing  a  hundred  and  fifty  or  two  hundred 
pounds  as  carelessly  as  you  could  handle  a  va- 
lise.    Steadily  the  raised  platforms  on  the  rafts 


SI.OWI,Y    THE  RAFTS    SANK   UNDDR   THK   WEllGHT. 
172 


OFF   ON   THE   LONG  DRIFT      173 

piled  higher  with  the  accumulating  baggage, 
while  slowly  the  rafts  sank  under  the  weight, 
until  the  logs  were  entirely  covered  by  the  muddy 
current.  As  the  last  package  was  put  aboard, 
the  Leccos  began  lashing  the  cargo  in  place  with 
our  spare  rope  and  the  long  vines  which  they 
used  for  towiiig  the  rafts  up-stream.  They  used 
as  much  care  in  throwing  and  tightening  the  lash- 
ings as  though  stowing  the  pack  on  a  "  bad " 
mule  for  a  mountain-trail,  rather  than  a  cargo 
raft  that  was  only  to  drift  with  the  current.  It 
seemed  absurd. 

"Here,  good,"  grunted  a  Lecco,  waving  a 
hand  toward  the  mill-race  current;  "below, 
very  bad,  patron,  muy  peligroso — yes." 

When  later  we  struck  the  "  bad  places,"  and 
waist-deep  in  the  boiling,  angry  waters  of  the 
canons,  clung  to  those  same  lashings,  to  keep  our- 
selves from  being  washed  overboard,  the  need  of 
lashing  for  the  baggage  was  plain. 

The  intend ente,  the  jefe  politico,  and  the  only 
postmaster  for  many  leagues  of  this  virgin  in- 
terior came  down  to  tender  us  his  farewell  em- 
braces ;  for  as  a  strict  matter  of  fact  those  three 
functionaries  resided  in  the  single  person  of  that 
one  short,   stocky  Cholo  half-breed,  who  had 


174 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


given  all  the  hospitality  in  his  power  during  the 
dreary  weeks  of  waiting  in  his  little  palm- 
thatched  domain,  but  whose  Aymara  wife  had 
viewed  us  with  such  sullen  hospitality.  OfBci- 
ally  he  noted  with 
approval  that  we 
had  already  com- 
plied with  the 
Bolivian  regula- 
tions in  regard  to 
navigation,  and  at 
the  bow  floated  the 
green,  yellow,  and 
red  flag  of  Bolivia, 
and  with  much 
curiosity  he  viewed 
our  American  flag 
fluttering  at  the 
stern.  It  was  the  ^  /- 
first  he    had    ever      ir 

^^    _  T^  'J  THE      SHREWISH      I^EATHER-SKINNED 

seen.       It    gamed,  indian  wife. 
too,  much  approval  from  the  Leccos,  its  decora- 
tive scheme  of  stars  and  red  and  white  bars 
drawing  admiring  comment,  and  we  could  have 
Sold  it  many  times  over  as  dress  goods  or  as 


OFF   ON   THE   LONG  DRIFT      175 

strictly  high-class  shirting.  As  a  special  mark 
of  favor  the  shrewish,  leather-skinned  Indian 
wife  of  the  Cholo  jefe  came  down  to  see  us  off, 
and  while  we  patted  her  lord  on  the  back  in 
our  mutually  polite  embracings,  she  fluttered 
in  the  background,  clacking  unintelligible,  but 
cordial,  Aymara  farewells. 

When  first  we  had  dismounted  in  this  tiny  set- 
tlement of  Mapiri  this  Aymara  woman  had 
borne  us  a  fierce  dislike  that  was  kept  from  literal 
and  open  war  only  by  the  strong  hand  of  her 
Cholo  lord.  A  little  later,  unfortunately,  one 
of  our  men,  in  making  his  offering  of  candles  in 
the  little  mud-walled  chapel,  had  ignited  a  saint. 
When  I  saw  the  saint  shortly  after,  his  vest- 
ments were  charred  shreds,  he  was  as  bald  as  a 
singed  chicken,  and  his  waxen  features  had  co- 
agulated into  limp  benevolence,  out  of  which  his 
sole  remaining  glass  eye  stared  mildly.  He  had 
been  placed  on  a  little  table  up  against  a  mud 
wall,  and  the  Indian  women  were  weeping  and 
wailing  before  him  in  abject  apology.  They 
were  hastily  offering  flowers,  candles,  and  liba- 
tions, but  with  this  last  straw  the  Aymara  lady's 
dislike  had  become  even  a  more  fixed,  fanatical 
hatred. 


176  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

Shrewish,  unattractive,  and  savage  though  she 
was,  she  was  devoted  in  her  love  for  her  Cholo 
husband.  Some  time  after  the  burying  of  the 
saint,  one  night  their  son  developed  a  difference 
with  his  father  in  which  each  tried  to  kill  the 
other.  The  father  had  just  reached  his  gun  and 
would  have  been  successful  when,  being  thick- 
necked,  violent,  and  full-blooded,  he  toppled 
over  in  a  stroke  of  apoplexy.  There  being  no 
doctor,  not  even  an  Aymara  yatari  within  three 
hundred  miles,  the  old  lady  turned  to  us  in  a 
panic,  and,  probably  despite  our  amateur  efforts, 
the  Cholo  pulled  through.  In  the  meantime  the 
poor  old  woman  fluttered  about  in  an  agony  of 
helpless  fear  and  love,  eagerly  hanging  on  the 
slow  words  of  translation  that  came  to  her,  for 
she  spoke  nothing  but  Aymara,  and  everything 
had  to  be  translated  first  into  Spanish  and  then 
into  her  own  tongue.  That  very  night  she 
burned  a  box  of  candles  before  the  charred  saint, 
while  in  the  morning  we  had  for  our  breakfast  a 
fine  chicken  apiece.  Her  gratitude  endured, 
and  in  the  quivering  furnace  heat  she  had  come 
to  see  us  depart,  and  as  we  waded  aboard  she 
followed  us  and  laid  on  the  cargo  a  pair  of  live 
chickens  as  a  final  gift. 


OFF   ON   THE   LONG  DRIFT      177 

The  Cholo  handed  us  a  small  sack  of  mail, 
asking  us  to  distribute  it  on  our  way  down  the 
Rio  Mapiri,  these  irregular  trips  being  the  sole 
means  of  mail  communication  with  the  rubber 
barracas  of  this  far  interior;  the  Leccos  cast  off 
the  vine  ropes  that  moored  us,  and  a  few  strokes 
of  their  heavy  paddles  swung  us  out  into  the  full, 
swift  current  of  the  river.  As  we  struck  it  there 
was  no  feeling  of  speed  or  even  of  motion,  but 
immediately  the  green  walls  on  each  side  of  the 
river  began  flitting  past  in  a  shimmering  ribbon 
of  confused  green  jungle.  In  a  moment,  far  be- 
hind, came  the  crackling  of  rifle-shots.  It  was 
the  Cholo  and  his  Winchester  in  salute;  even 
while  we  were  pulling  our  guns  to  reply  he  and 
his  wife  had  dwindled  to  tiny  dots  that  the  sound 
of  our  guns  could  have  reached  only  as  a  faint 
echo.  Then  a  bend  in  the  river  hid  them  from 
view,  and  my  river  voyage  had  begun. 

The  balsas  were  slender  rafts  of  very  buoyant 
logs  spiked  together  with  heavy  pins  of  black 
palm;  they  had  a  rough  bow  made  by  the 
crooked  center  log,  which  turned  up  in  a  snout- 
like projection,  giving  the  affair  a  curiously  ani- 
mal-like and  amphibious  expression.  For  the 
return  voyage  three  of  these  balsas  were  lashed 


178  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

side  by  side  with  cross-logs  and  strips  of  the  in- 
ner bark  of  some  tree.  The  callapo,  as  this  com- 
bination is  called,  is  entirely  submerged  and  ex- 
cept for  the  cargo  platform  and  the  turned-up 
snouts,  nothing  is  visible  above  the  muddy  river. 
As  we  disappeared  around  the  bend  in  the 
swift  current,  the  hills  against  the  background 
seemed  to  close  in  upon  us,  and  as  they  narrowed^ 
the  muddy  river  snapped  and  crackled  in  peev- 
ish, little  waves.  The  banks  grew  steeper,  and 
the  air  damp  and  cool,  and  although  directly 
overhead  there  was  the  glaring  blue  sky  of  the 
forenoon,  yet  we  moved  swiftly  through  an  at- 
mosphere of  evening.  Long,  trailing  creepers 
drooped  from  the  overhanging  trees  into  the  cur- 
rent near  the  banks  and  cut  the  water  like  the 
spray  from  the  bow  of  a  trim  launch;  the  soft 
murmur  of  rapidly  moving  water  rose,  and  was 
broken  only  now  and  then  by  the  shrill  cries  of 
parrots  flying  high  overhead ;  sometimes  a  pair  of 
macaws,  with  their  gaudy  plumage  flashing  in 
the  high  sun  flitted  across  the  gorge.  But 
though  the  river  doubled  and  twisted  among  the 
hills,  there  were  yet,  according  to  Lecco  stand- 
ards, no  "  bad  places,"  and  they  passed  the  bottle 
of  cafiassa  sociably  around  ameng  themselves, 


OFF  ON   THE  LONG  DRIFT      179 

inspecting   their   passengers  with   interest   and 
chuckling  over  their  own  comments.     They  had 


THERE    WERE,    ACCORDING    TO    THE    I.ECCO    STANDARDS,    AS    YET    NO 
"  BAD   PI^ACES/" 

never  seen  a  man  with  eye-glasses  before,  and  I 
was  a  matter  of  fine  interest  and  guesswork. 
What  were  those  panes  of  glass  for?  Cautiously 
they  would  make  a  little  circle  with  their  fingers 
and  thumbs  and  peer  through  it  to  see  what  effect 
of  improvement  might  result.  I  received  my 
name,  "  the  four-eyed  patron,"  promptly. 

The  whole  crew  of  Leccos  was  amiably  drunk; 
it  is  the  custom  of  the  river,  and  it  seems  in  no 
way  to  impair  their  efficiency.     It  has  become 


i8o  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

their  right  by  long  custom,  and  one  that  it  is  not 
prudent  to  disregard;  for  a  trader,  being  of  a 
thrifty  turn  and  not  caring  to  buy  the  canassa, 
decided  to  run  the  river  on  a  strict  prohibition 
platform.  Every  one  of  his  callapos  was  curi- 
ously enough  v^recked  in  the  same  rapids  on  the 
day  after  he  announced  his  thrifty  principles. 
The  general  allowances  is  about  two  quarts  a  day 
for  three  men,  and  perhaps,  if  the  day  has  been  a 
hard  one,  a  small  teacupful  each  in  the  camp. 
Money  to  them  has  no  value  compared  with  can- 
assa. Once,  when  trying  to  buy  a  fine  bead  neck- 
band from  a  Lecco,  I  offered  him  money  up  to 
a  dollar,  Bolivian,  the  equivalent  of  eight  bot- 
tles of  canassa,  and  he  refused,  for  his  Lecco 
sweetheart  had  made  it;  then  I  began  to  barter 
all  over  again  by  offering  him  a  bottle  of  can- 
assa, and  at  once  he  handed  me  the  neck-band 
without  question. 

While  the  current  was  swift,  from  eight  to 
ten  miles  an  hour,  we  had  not  come  to  the  bad 
rapids.  Sometimes  the  river  would  open  out 
into  broad  shallows,  where  the  callapo  would 
bump  and  scrape  along  over  the  bottom,  and 
then  would  close  up  into  another  gorge  that  in 
its  turn  would  merge  into  tortuous  canons  with 


OFF   ON   THE   LONG  DRIFT      i8i 


LECCOS    LOWERING    THE    CALI.APO    THROUGH    SHALLOWS. 

bluff  walls  of  rock.  Drunk  though  the  Leccos 
were,  yet  their  river  skill  did  not  seem  to  be  af- 
fected When  we  floated  along  the  quieter 
reaches,  they  would  play  like  silly  children.  Oc- 
casionally one  would  be  tumbled  into  the  river, 
and  would  swim  alongside  in  sheepish  embar- 
rassment until  he  decided  to  climb  aboard,  amid 
the  pleased  cackles  of  the  rest. 

One,  a  young  Lecco  about  seventeen  or  eigh- 
teen years  old,  who  handled  one  of  the  stern 
paddles,  accidentally  stepped  off  backward  into 
the  river.  The  others  shrieked  with  delight  as 
the  Lecco  struck  out  for  shore.  We  saw  him 
land,  pull  his  machete  out  from  under  his  shirt, 
and  start  chopping  down  some  saplings.    Per- 


1 82 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


haps  fifteen  minutes  later,  in  the  next  milder 
stretch  of  river,  down  came  the  Lecco  like  a  cow- 
puncher  on  a  pony,  only  his  pony  was  a  bundle 
of  mere  sticks  lashed  together  with  vine,  and  in 
place  of  a  rope  he  swung  a  bamboo  pole,  using 
it  as  a  paddle.  He  was  standing  up  like  a  cir- 
cus-rider on  his  frail  raft,  shifting  it  with  his 
pole  over  to  where  the  current  was  swiftest,  and 
he  coasted  down  the  inclined  glissade  between 
rocks,  avoiding  every  little  eddy  and  catching 
only  the  roughest  and  swift- 
est places,  until  presently  he 
had  worked  his  way  along- 
side and  stepped  aboard 
again.  His  little  bundle  of 
sticks  did  not  number  ten, 
and  not  one  was  as  thick  as 
your  wrist,  while  merely 
two  bits  of  vine  at  each  end 
held  them  together. 

I  asked  what  would 
have  happened  had  the 
vine  lashings  broke.  When  that  was  translated 
to  the  Leccos,  they  roared  with  laughter.  That, 
it  was  explained  to  me,  was  what  they  were  hop- 
ing for,  so  that  then  he  would  have  had  to  swim. 


THE    IvECCO    OF    THE    TWiO 
RAFT. 


OFF  ON   THE  LONG  DRIFT      183 

Swim!  A  fine  joke  to  swim  rapids  and  whirl- 
pools that  looked  like  sure  death  or  worse  mang- 
ling. But  I  found  later  that  any  one  of  them 
could  have  done  it  on  even  worse  passages.  If 
they  are  sure  to  be  caught  in  a  whirlpool,  they 
will  dive,  and  the  fury  of  the  rapid  itself  troubles 
them  not  the  least.  A  Lecco  once,  to  avoid  a 
whipping  by  his  rubber  boss,  threw  himself  into 
the  river  and  swam  six  miles  in  the  worst  sec- 
tion of  the  river  without  a  thought.  A  German 
later  attempted  to  swim  the  mildest  of  these,  and 
his  broken  body  was  picked  up  in  an  eddy  three 
miles  below. 


CHAPTER  XIII 


THE  LECCO  TRIBE 


THESE  Leccos  are  among  the  finest  Indians, 
or  semi-civilized  savages,  I  have  met. 
They  are  sturdy  and  muscular,  with  a  dis- 
tinctly Malaysian  suggestiveness,  and  very  sup- 
erior to  any  of  the 
surrounding  s  a  v  - 
age  tribes  of  the  in- 
terior. Yet  they 
have  neither  relig- 
ion nor  supersti- 
tion; they  have  no 
legend  or  tradition, 
and  their  only  his- 
torical recollection 
is  from  the  time 
when  quinine  bark 
was  the  main  river 
commerce  instead 
of    rubber  —  the 

time  of  the  "  Great  j^^f/^g!'^^^""  "^^  ''''''''''  ""^^  ^'''^''' 

184' 


THE   LEGCO    TRIBE  185 

Quina  "  they  call  it, — about  half  a  century  ago. 
They  are  brave  and  loyal,  although  not  a  fight- 
ing race,  and  have  made  but  a  poor  showing 
against  the  neighboring  tribes.  Their  life  is  on 
the  river,  chiefly  this  Rio  Mapiri,  and  they  stick 
close  to  its  banks.  Their  sole  v^ork  is  transpor- 
tation with  these  balsas  and  callapos  up  and 
down  the  river. 

For  months  in  the  year  the  stream  is  virtually 
closed  by  reason  of  the  rains  and  the  impassable 
canons.  Down  stream  is  simple  and  finely  excit- 
ing, but  against  the  currents  up-stream,  portag- 
ing or  hauling  the  balsas  through  the  canons, 
where  there  is  often  barely  a  hand-hold  on  the 
naked  walls  of  rock,  and  often  vines  must  be 
lowered  from  above,  drenched  during  the  day 
and  sleeping  on  the  sand  playas  at  night,  is  the 
hardest  kind  of  labor.  As  had  happened  while 
they  were  trying  to  reach  me  on  this  trip,  the 
food  gives  out — it  is  not  a  game  country — and 
unless  they  are  near  enough  to  the  goal  to  live  on 
nuts  and  berries,  as  they  did  for  two  days  on  this 
occasion,  they  have  to  go  back,  replenish,  and 
start  over  again,  with  all  the  previous  labor  lost. 
And  there  is  scarcely  a  free  Lecco  among  them ; 
they  are  always  in  debt  to  the  rubber  barracas, 
who  by  the  sale  and  purchase  of  their  debts  pas$ 


1 86  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

them  as  veritable  chattels.  With  thriftless,  un- 
thinking good  nature,  they  accept  this  condition 
and  at  the  end  of  each  trip  will  squander  their 
credit-wages  on  worthless  trifles.  A  Lecco 
friend  of  mine  once  squandered  the  wages  of  a 
whole  hard  trip  up-stream  on  a  woman's  straw 
hat  and  its  mass  of  pink- ribbon  bows  that  he 
wore  for  two  days  in  great  pride  on  the  drift 
down-stream  until  it  was  lost  overboard  in  one 
of  the  worst  rapids.  He  watched  it  whirling  off 
in  the  spray  and  foam  with  a  childish  pleasure 
and  no  sense  of  loss,  but  rather  with  the  calm 
complacency  of  a  man  who  had  lost  a  trifle  and 
could  with  easy  labor  earn  another. 

The  Indians  whom  I  had  met  before  were  the 
Quechuas  and  the  Aymaras,  the  great  tribes  of 
the  high  plains;  heavy-boned,  stocky,  and  pow- 
erful peoples,  who,  in  feature  and  color  strongly 
resemble  our  own  Sioux  and  Apache  type. 
These  Leccos,  on  the  contrary,  were  slender, 
well-built  men,  with  a  direct,  soft  quickness  of 
movement  that  revealed  the  perfect  strength  that 
lay  behind  it.  In  feature  they  were  absolutely 
Malay — a  perfect  reproduction  of  any  of  the 
Malay  tribes  that  fringe  the  coast  of  Asia. 

Other  rivers  have  the  balsa  and  the  callapo 
too,  and  the  long  rapids  through  narrow  gorges, 


THE   LEGCO    TRIBE  187 

but  the  Indians  of  those  rivers  lie  down  and 
clutch  for  safety  when  they  go  through  them. 
Your  Lecco  goes  into  the  boiling  smother  of  a 
cataract  with  a  grinning  yell  of  pure  joy,  and 
keeps  his  feet  like  a  Glo'ster  skipper  in  a  high 
gale. 

The  balsa  of  the  Leccos  is  a  raft  made  of  the 
light,  corky  wood  from  which  it  takes  its  name. 
Eight-inch  logs  of  this  balsa  wood  are  pinned 
together  with  palm  spikes  from  the  hard, 
black  palm  that  is  also  used  as  arrow-points  and 
for  bows.  When  floating  in  the  water  it  looks 
like  some  unwieldy  amphibian  that  has  risen  to 
the  surface  for  a  fresh  supply  of  air.  It  is  gen- 
erally about  twenty-five  feet  long  and  about  four 
feet  wide.  The  Leccos  lash  three  balsas  to- 
gether, broadside  on,  by  means  of  stout  cross- 
logs  tied  with  strips  of  bark  or  vine,  and  this  re- 
sult is  called  a  callapo.  It  is  a  structure  that  is 
capable  of  carrying  some  three  tons  of  cargo — 
that  is  if  handled  by  Leccos. 

The  first  thing  that  impressed  me  about  these 
Leccos  was  the  distinctness  with  which  they  re- 
presented another  race.  It  was  not  the  mere 
divergence  of  tribe;  it  was  more  fundamental — 
it  was  a  racial  difference.  There  was  nothing 
in  it  to  suggest  even  a  remote  relation  to  any  of 


i88 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


the  tribes  with  whom  I  had  come  in  contact  up 
to  that  time,  or,  for  that  matter,  with  any  of 
those  that  I  subsequently  met.  To  begin  with, 
the  Leccos  looked  clean — a  condition  that  one 
seldom  finds  in  the  Quichua  or  Aymara  nations ; 
although  cleanliness  is  almost  an  invariable  con- 
dition of  all  river  peoples.  Their  complexion 
was  of  the  soft,  warm  brown  of  the  Hindu  or 
the  Filipino,  having  no  suggestion  of  the  dull 
chocolate  of  the  negro  or  the  weather-beaten 
copper  of  the  Aymaras  or  of  our  own  Western 
Indians. 

Their  features  again  are  decidedly  Malay- 
sian— straight  high  nose  with  thin  nostrils ;  fore- 
head fairly  high  and  well' 
shaped;  finely  cut  thin  lips, 
and  the  narrow,  though  not 
slanting  eyes  of  the  East. 
The  hair  is  oily  jet-black, 
thick,  and  grows  to  a  point 
on  the  forehead,  in  the  style 
made  known  by  Aguinaldo, 
and  is  kept  neatly  cut  in  a 
straight,  bristly  pompadour. 
They  do  not  care  for  the 
NAPoi^EON  A  i.^cco  cnm  g^udy  feather  head-dresses 


THE   LEGCO    TRIBE 


189 


/:^^^ 


of  their  savage  neighbors 
— not  even  ear-rings — and 
for  head  decorations  are 
content  with  the  brilliant 
bandanna  of  the  trader, 
twisted  and  tied  in  a  band 
about  the  head  in  very  much 
the  same  manner  as  used  by 
our  own  Apaches  of  Ari- 
zona. A  band  necklace  of  Y^^<  ^ 
bright  beads,  strung  and  de-  ^-^  "^ 
signed  in  simple  patterns  by  a  i.e:cco  typ^. 
their  own  women,  on  threads  of  wild  cotton,  is 
their  only  ornament.  These  are  almost  invari- 
ably worn  by  the  men  only  and  are  tied  tightly 
about  the  throat. 

Another  striking  point  about  the  Leccos,  one 
in  which  they  differ  from  all  of  the  "  barbaros," 
or  the  savages  of  the  Amazon  tributaries,  is  their 
muscular  development.  The  barbaro  in  this 
respect  is  very  deficient.  He  is  strong  almost 
beyond  belief,  but  it  is  the  strength  of  sinew  and 
not  of  muscle.  It  is  like  the  strength  of  the 
monkey,  that  is  not  made  visible  by  the  ordi- 
nary signs  of  muscular  development.  The  bar- 
baro has  no  apparent  deltoid,  no  biceps,  no  tri- 


190  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

ceps,  none  of  the  finely  developed  muscles  of  the 
leg  and  thigh  that  with  us  make  for  strength. 
He  is  built  like  an  undeveloped  boy  who  has 
suddenly  suffered  from  too  rapid  growth.  The 
Leccos,  on  the  contrary,  are  beautifully  de- 
veloped physically;  knotted  muscles  shift  and 
play  evenly  under  the  soft  skin  and  suggest  a 
swift  sureness  of  movement  and  a  strength  of 
endurance  that  are  demanded  in  their  life  on  the 
river. 

The  likeness  of  these  people  to  the  Malays  is 
still  further  accented  by  their  costume.  They 
wear  rather  tight  breechs  of  white  tucuyo,  a 
coarse  muslin,  that  taper  to  the  ankle,  and  above 
it  a  short  shirt  of  gaudy  red,  yellow,  or  blue, 
or  even  sometimes  white,  though  the  red  is 
popularly  regarded  as  the  most  aristocratic. 
The  shirt  is  cut  square  with  the  armholes  in  the 
two  upper  corners.  The  hole  for  the  head  is 
emblazoned  by  a  border  of  crude  design  cut 
from  varied-colored  calicos  and  sewed  on.  In 
the  course  of  many  days'  association  with  them, 
I  discovered  that  the  little  chipa,  or  bag  of 
native-woven  wild  cotton,  which  every  Lecco 
carries  with  him  on  any  of  his  river  expeditions, 
is  filled  with  clean  clothing.     The  muddy  water 


THE  LEGCO   TRIBE  191 

of  the  Rio  Mapiri  and  the  Rio  Kaka — ^which 
the  Mapiri  becomes  farther  down — soils  every- 
thing it  touches,  and  so  the  Leccos,  who  are  as 
much  in  the  water  as  out  of  it,  regularly  changed 
their  garments  daily,  only  making  an  exception 
when  some  extra-hard  passages  would  have 
made  it  a  useless  extravagance. 

In  my  contact  with  the  South  American  In- 
dians, whether  among  the  high  plains  of  the 
Andes  or  among  the  forests  drained  by  the  trib- 
utaries of  the  Amazon,  I  received  rather  the  im- 
pression of  inert,  passive  races ;  of  peoples  who 
were  patiently  hoping  for  the  return  of  the 
legendary  days  of  their  fathers,  yet  who,  dimly, 
in  some  way  felt  that  the  hope  was  vain.  It 
might  poetically  be  interpreted  as  a  vague  con- 
sciousness of  their  doom  of  ultimate  extinction. 
The  Lecco  is  probably  doomed  to  extinction  as 
well,  but  he  is  by  no  means  a  despondent  speci- 
men. On  the  contrary,  no  more  cheery,  indeed 
hilarious,  outfit  can  be  imagined  than  that  with 
which  we  embarked  on  our  callapos  at  Mapiri. 
Candor  compels  me  to  own  that  this  exuberance 
of  spirits  was  probably  largely  alcoholic,  for  it 
is  one  of  the  few  rights  to  which  he  clings 
tenaciously — that    of    being  allowed    to    keep 


192  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

drunk  while  making  a  voyage  on  the  river.  For 
the  Lecco  will  not  work  to  any  good  purpose  if 
kept  sober;  they  feel  that  they  have  been  de- 
frauded and  cheated  of  an  inalienable  right,  and 
at  the  first  convenient  opportunity  they  will 
avenge  the  injury  by  running  the  callapo  on  a 
rock  in  a  rapid,  while  they  themselves  will  swim 
through  it  like  otters  and  make  the  shore  below 
safe  and  unrepentant.  Unlike  all  other  savages, 
who  become  treacherous  and  turbulent  under 
the  influence  of  liquor,  the  Lecco  becomes  even 
more  genial  and  jovial  when  in  his  cups.  He  is 
pre-eminently  a  man  of  peace. 

From  the  moment  that  we  shoved  out  into  the 
stream  everything  was  a  huge  joke.  If  one 
slipped  on  the  submerged  logs  of  the  callapo 
and  floundered  overboard,  the  rest  hailed  it  with 
yells  of  delight,  and  they  dug  their  heavy 
paddles  into  the  water  and  tried  to  pull  the  cal- 
lapo beyond  his  reach.  The  victim  would  dive 
and  come  up  in  some  unexpected  place,  where 
the  effect  of  the  black  pompadour  and  the  beady 
eyes  suddenly  popping  above  the  opaque  depths 
of  an  eddy,  followed  by  a  damp,  sheepish  grin, 
was  irresistibly  funny. 

They  are  perfectly  at  home  in  the  water,  and 


THE   LEGCO    TRIBE  193 

will  swim  any  rapid  and  the  dangerous  whirl- 
pools that  are  constantly  forming  below  them, 
without  hesitation — places  that  it  would  be  fatal 
for  a  white  man  to  attempt.  There  is  a  story  of 
a  Lecco  who  went  through  the  most  dangerous 
of  the  rapids  with  his  wife  and  baby  and  a  mule 
— the  mule  and  baby  inclosed  in  a  framework 
of  palm  amidships  on  the  balsa,  and  the  wife 
helping  with  a  paddle  at  the  stern.  They  made 
the  passage  safely,  but  it  was  the  survival  of  the 
mule  that  excited  their  admiration. 

Their  huts  are  one-roomed  affairs  with  the 
floor  of  beaten  clay,  upon  which,  at  night,  are 
laid  woven  grass  mats  that  serve  as  beds.  The 
walls  are  of  charo — a  kind  of  poor  relative  of 
the  bamboo — lashed  to  a  slender  framework  of 
the  same  material  by  split  strips  of  the  mora,  the 
typical  hut  of  the  tropical  frontier.  Stout  posts 
sunk  at  the  corners  give  the  strength  to  support 
the  roof.  The  huts  are  about  ten  by  fifteen  feet. 
The  steep-pitched  roof  is  thatched  with  split 
palm-leaves  that  render  it  water-proof  even  in 
the  heavy  tropical  thunder-storms.  A  high 
broad  shelf  at  one  end  serves  as  a  second  story 
and  a  place  of  storage.  In  some  there  is  a  low 
shelf  of  charo  along  one  side  that  serves  as  the 


194  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

family  bed,  though  these  latter  are  only  in  the 
houses  of  the  more  ambitious  Leccos.  All  cook- 
ing is  done  at  one  end  over  an  open  fire,  the 
smoke  escaping  as  best  it  may  through  the  inter- 
stices between  the  layers  of  charo.  A  single 
door  is  the  only  opening. 

Near  by  is  the  little  platano  or  plantain 
patch,  and  a  few  yuccas.  A  few  scrawny  chick- 
ens use  the  house  as  their  headquarters,  and  are 
reserved  for  fiestas.  A  pot  or  two,  purchased 
from  the  traders  complete  the  household  equip- 
ment. Invariably  they  boil  their  food,  even  to 
the  platanos  that  are  so  much  better  roasted. 
This  is  in  striking  contrast  to  the  barbaros  of  the 
farther  interior,  who  are  without  the  knowledge 
of  boiling  food ;  they  either  eat  it  raw  or  roast  it 
slightly. 

The  Lecco  women  are  also  as  distinctly  Ma- 
laysian in  appearance  as  the  men.  They  have 
fine  figures  and  retain  the  free  gracefulness  of 
carriage  of  the  nude  savage,  and,  up  to  the  time 
they  are  sixteen,  if  not  absolutely  pretty  in  fea- 
ture, are  distinctly  pleasing.  One,  however, 
that  I  saw  in  the  rubber  barraca  of  Caimalebra, 
living  with  a  Bolivian  refugee  murderer,  was 
an  absolute  beauty  by  any  standards  of  compari- 


THE  LEGCO   TRIBE  195 

son.  They  were  living  happily,  and  on  one 
trip  I  enjoyed  their  hospitality  for  five  days. 
The  single  garment  of  the  women  is  an  exag- 
geration of  the  Lecco  shirt,  reaching  nearly  to 
the  ankles.  It  is  pleasing  in  its  effect,  and  sets 
off  the  graceful  beauty  of  their  figures  in  a  way 
that  recalls  the  simple  fashions  of  the  Hawaiian 
and  Polynesian  peoples.  The  women  of  other 
tribes  are  apt  to  adopt  slatternly  skirts  after 
their  introduction  to  the  frontier  civilization. 

The  girls  are  fully  developed  at  fourteen,  and 
they  usually  mate  a  year  or  so  later  with  a  Lecco 
boy  of  about  their  own  age.  The  boy  at  that 
time  is  a  full-fledged  balsero  and  able  to  hold  his 
own  in  the  struggle  with  the  river — their  only 
test  of  arrival  at  man's  estate. 

Sometimes  a  mission  priest  comes  down  the 
river,  and  then,  if  the  family  has  prospered, 
there  will  be  a  grand  fiesta  and  a  marriage  will 
be  performed  according  to  the  rites  of  the 
Church.  This  will  cost  forty  bolivians — about 
eighteen  dollars — for  the  priest's  fee,  and  con- 
siderably more  for  the  drunken  orgy  that  fol- 
lows. To  have  been  married  according  to  the 
ceremonies  of  the  Church  is  a  great  distinction, 
and  also  a  rare  one. 


1196  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Of  any  form  or  ceremonial  that  the  Leccos 
may  have  had  at  one  time,  there  is  not  a  trace  left. 
All  vestiges  of  their  own  original  superstitions 
have  long  disappeared.  Nominally  they  are 
Catholics,  and  are  claimed  as  such  by  the 
padres,  but  in  reality  they  are  without  religion 
or  belief.  The  rites  of  baptism  and  marriage 
seem  to  appeal  to  them,  but  apparently  more  on 
the  ground  of  the  superior  dignity  that  is  lent  to 
the  following  fiesta.  Baptism  is  performed  by 
any  trader  who  happens  to  be  passing  on  the 
river,  and  to  their  complete  satisfaction,  while 
his  crew  is  impressed  as  godfathers.  I  was  in- 
vited to  perform  it  once,  but  declined^  to  their 
evident  disappointment. 

There  are  no  ceremonies  attending  the  death 
and  burial  of  a  Lecco.  During  the  last  illness 
the  neighbors  may  drop  in  on  a  visit  of  sym- 
pathy, and  canassa  will  be  handed  around. 
When  death  occurs,  one  member  of  the  family, 
the  husband,  son,  or  son-in-law,  wraps  the  body 
in  a  piece  of  tucuyo,  and  carries  it  on  his  shoul- 
der to  a  secluded  place  in  the  jungle,  and  there 
buries  it.  The  slight  mound  above  the  grave  is 
its  only  mark,  and  that  disappears  after  the  lapse 
of  a  season  or  two.     Apparently  there  is  no  idea 


THE   LEGCO    TRIBE  (197 

of  spirits  haunting  these  places,  for  the  Leccos 
pass  them  without  hesitation  after  nightfall — 
something  that  the  Cholos  do  not  care  or  are 
afraid  to  do. 

The  Lecco  families  are  small.  Two  or,  at  the 
most,  three  babies  are  the  rule,  and  it  is  not  at  all 
uncommon  to  find  a  childless  family.  Canassa 
and  the  frequent  drunken  fiestas  that  are  their 
only  relaxation  seem  to  be  the  means  by  which 
they  are  accomplishing  the  suicide  of  their  race. 
Girl  babies  are  preferred  to  boys;  for  when  a 
daughter  marries,  her  husband  will  eventually 
have  to  support  her  parents.  But  with  a  son  it 
is  recognized  that  his  duty  is  to  his  wife  and  her 
people.  The  women  are  faithful  to  their  men, 
if  their  men  care  for  them  and  guard  them;  but 
if  the  men  become  careless  or  apparently  indiff- 
erent, the  women  regard  it  as  a  tacit  relinquish- 
ing of  the  rights  of  fidelity,  and  establish  such 
casual  relations  as  suit  them. 

With  rare  exceptions  the  men  are,  in  effect,  in 
a  state  of  slavery.  The  debt  system  prevails, 
and  they  are  easy  victims.  The  trader  spreads 
his  gaudy  stock  of  trade  stuffs  before  the  Lecco, 
and  the  Lecco  buys  recklessly  whatever  attracts 
him  at  the  moment.     The  trader  gives  him  full 


198  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

swing  at  first,  and  the  Lecco  gets  himself  heavily 
in  debt.  And  that  debt  is  allowed  to  the  exact 
extent  of  each  particular  Lecco's  value  as  a  bal- 
sero  or  rubber-picker.  A  well-to-do  balsero  has 
a  debt  of  two  thousand  bolivians;  poorer  ones 
less.  And  the  Leccos  are  valued  as  slaves  in  the 
terms  of  the  debt.  The  Lecco  never  gets  free 
from  his  debt. 

Of  his  race  the  Lecco  has  no  knowledge.  He 
has  no  written  language — not  even  primitive 
hieroglyphs  or  crude  pictures.  He  is  even 
without  a  primitive  instrument  for  making 
music.  To  all  questions  about  themselves,  as  to 
where  their  fathers  lived  before  them,  or  as  to 
where  their  families  came  from  even  before  that, 
or  to  the  flattering  questions  as  to  the  time  when 
the  Leccos  "  were  a  great  people,"  they  have  but 
one  date  to  give.  That  is  the  "  time  of  the  Great 
Quina,"  when  the  bark  of  the  quinine  was  worth 
a  dollar  and  ten  cents  a  pound,  gold,  on  the 
river.  This  is  their  only  date,  and  it  was  about 
sixty  or  seventy  years  ago. 

They  rigidly  retain  their  own  dialect,  which 
they  call  the  Riki-Riki,  although  they  have  ac- 
quired a  Spanish  patois  in  their  dealing  with  the 
traders  on  the  river.    The  Riki-Riki  is  strongly 


THE   LEGCO   TRIBE  199 

labial,  though  with  many  guttural  sounds,  and, 
like  most  barbaric  tongues,  is  impossible  to  re- 
produce with  our  alphabet.  The  counting  re- 
duplicates systematically  and  on  the  basis  of  five, 
instead  of  ten  as  in  our  system. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

DRIFTING  DOWN  THE  RIO  MAPIRI 

THAT  night  we  made  camp  on  a  sand  bar 
in  one  of  the  more  open  reaches  of  water 
and  close  to  the  river's  edge.  With  their 
short  machetes  the  Leccos  cut  some  canes,  un- 
lashed  our  tentage  from  the  platforms,  and 
rigged  a  rough  shelter.  In  the  balmy  air  of  the 
sunset  there  was  no  indication  that  it  was  needed, 
but  during  this  season  a  tropical  rain  comes  up 
with  the  suddenness  of  a  breeze,  and  pitching  a 
tent  in  a  driving  downpour  in  the  darkness  of 
perdition  is  no  light  pleasure.  For  themselves, 
the  Leccos  simply  threw  a  matting  of  woven 
palm-leaves  on  the  sand  and  their  camp  was 
made.  The  bank  was  lined  with  a  fringe  of 
driftwood,  and  Spanish  cedar  and  mahogany 
made  admirable  fuel,  and  gave  one  at  the  same 
time  a  sense  of  wanton,  extravagant  luxury  that 
the  humbler  cooking  fires  of  our  North  never 

200 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO   MAPIRI    201 

obtain.  Presently  little  fires  crackled  into  life 
along  the  playa  while  gathering  around  each 
were  groups  of  Leccos  in  their  loose,  flapping, 
square  shirts,  or  else  stripped  to  the  waist  in  the 
hot  evening  air,  intent  on  the  small  pots  of  boil- 
ing rice,  platanos,  and  chalona.  Quickly  the 
velvet  darkness  of  the  tropics  fell,  and  the  high 
lights  flickered  on  naked  skins ;  slowly  the  moon 
rose  above  the  purple  hills  of  the  background, 
transforming  the  muddy  surface  of  the  swirling 
river  into  a  shimmer  of  molten  silver. 

The  smooth,  sandy  playa  softened  in  the  mel- 
low light,  while,  in  the  foreground,  the  camp- 
fires  threw  in  strong  relief  the  easy  play  of  naked 
muscles  in  the  shifting  groups  of  savage  figures ; 
beyond  were  other  figures  silhouetted  against  the 
night  or  merged  with  the  bulk  of  the  callapos, 
gently  swaying  at  the  river's  edge,  to  the  low 
roar  of  the  current.  The  subdued  chatter  of  the 
Leccos,  the  crackling  of  the  driftwood  flames, 
the  occasional  cry  of  some  morose  tropical  bird 
of  the  night,  and  once  in  a  while  the  far-off, 
snarling  howl  of  a  jaguar  in  the  hills  beyond 
blended  like  the  carefully  studied  tones  of  some 
painting,  and  the  peace  that  passeth  the  under- 
standing of  cities  descended. 


202  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

The  very  pleasing  moon  also  added  to  the  en- 
thusiasm of  the  sand  fleas  and  sand-hoppers; 
diabolical  out  of  all  proportion  to  their  physical 
capacity  and  by  the  aid  of  the  fourth  dimension 
triumphing  over  my  netting,  they  made  of  sleep 
a  periodic  and  exhausting  labor. 

I  looked  out  and  envied  the  impervious  Lec- 
cos;  half  naked  to  the  night  they  sprawled  on 
their  patches  of  palm  matting  and  only  awak- 
ened in  response  to  an  itching  thirst  and  then 
prowled  round  to  locate  the  extra  ration.  Some- 
where back  in  the  hills  were  the  savages,  the 
Chunchos  and  the  Yungus,  but  they  rarely  come 
down  to  this  river.  It  is  too  populous,  accord- 
ing to  their  standards,  and  precautions  against 
them  are  rarely  needed.  Farther  on,  when  we 
got  into  the  Rio  Kaka  and  the  Rio  Beni,  some 
care  was  essential;  and  it  was  necessary  to  camp 
on  the  largest  sand  bars  and  close  to  the  water's 
edge,  where  the  camp  could  not  be  rushed  in  a 
sudden  dash  from  the  jungle. 

The  next  morning,  with  the  first  faint  trickle 
of  dawn  along  the  rim  of  purple  hills,  the  camp 
was  astir.  A  single  fire  was  stirred  into  activity, 
and  in  the  dim,  gray  light  there  was  a  hasty  cup 
of  tea  and  a  raw  platano,  and  again  we  waded 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO  MAPIRI    203 

aboard  the  callapo  and  swung  out  into  the  cur- 
rent. The  cool  gray-green  of  the  early  morn- 
ing had  faded  to  a  delicate  sapphire;  the  purple 
hills  loomed  nearer  in  the  soft  haze;  above  them 
shimmering  waves  of  amethyst  overspread  half 
the  skies.  A  faint  glow  as  of  soft  coral  flickered 
over  the  crests  of  a  stray  cloud,  that,  close  after, 
flushed  with  the  bolder  brilliancy  of  the  ruby 
and  the  topaz.  There  was  no  pause;  one  color 
after  another,  exquisite  in  its  gorgeousness  or 
delicacy,  as  though  from  the  slowly  opening 
door  of  a  prismatic  furnace — crimson,  violet, 
deep-sea  blues,  and  old-gold — shifted  and  coiled 


w^  SEEM]eD  TO  Movn  WITH  intoi^erabi^e;  si,owne;s3, 


204  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

above  the  purple  hills.  A  thread  of  silver 
tipped  their  crests  and  then,  at  their  center,  there 
was  for  an  instant  the  gleam  of  molten  gold, 
and  a  second  more  above  the  low  morning  mist 
there  floated  the  glowing  mass  of  the  sun.  The 
day  had  begun. 

For  hours  we  drifted  down  the  swift  current. 
Now  and  then  a  snake  or  perhaps  an  otter  glided 
silently  into  the  eddies  as  we  drifted  by.  We 
seemed  to  move  with  intolerable  slowness  and 
yet  when  we  watched  the  jungle  on  each  side 
slipping  by,  we  could  see  the  speed — six,  eight, 
and  sometimes  ten  miles  an  hour.  The  sun  rose 
higher;  it  beat  down  on  the  unsheltered  callapo 
like  the  hot  blast  from  a  furnace;  the  animal 
sounds  in  the  forests  ceased;  the  faint  morning 
airs  died  away,  and  nothing  broke  the  stillness 
but  the  occasional  shrill  flocks  of  parrots.  The 
muddy  surface  of  the  river  turned  to  a  heated 
brazen  glare,  and  the  long  breakfastless  hours 
of  the  forenoon  crawled  past. 

Presently  as  we  swung  around  a  bend  there 
appeared  a  tiny  cane-walled  hut  surrounded  by 
a  few  platano  and  yucca  trees.  Splashing  in 
the  river  were  naked  little  babies,  and  as  our 
Leccos  set  up  a  shout  a  woman  trotted  down  to 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO   MAPIRI    205 

the  bank  and  waved  back.  We  paddled  out  of 
the  current  and  made  a  landing,  while  the  young 
Lecco  who  had  run  the  river  on  the  bundle  of 
sticks  took  on  a  sack  of  clean  clothes. 

The  Leccos  are  very  particular  in  these  mat- 
ters; each  morning  from  out  their  home-woven 
cotton  sacks  they  would  don  clean  trousers  and, 
shirt,  and  at  every  opportunity,  going  up  or 
down  the  river,  they  would  stop  and  turn  over 
to  the  Lecco  wife  the  soiled  ones  and  take  aboard 
a  clean  supply.  When  a  trip  is  too  long  for  a 
complete  outfit,  they  would  get  busy  at  each 
midday  breakfast  and  wash  their  own.  The 
sack  they  carried  would  hold  about  as  much  as 
a  small  keg,  and  it  was  always  crowded  to  its 
capacity  with  their  queer,  square  shirts  and  tight 
ankled  trousers.  Their  only  other  baggage  was 
a  plate,  a  spoon,  and  a  tiny  kettle  for  rice. 
Clean  clothes  every  day  is  a  peculiar  hobby  for 
a  primitive  tribe. 

This  Lecco  woman,  or,  rather,  girl,  who 
trotted  dow^n  to  the  water's  edge  was  about  six- 
teen, wore  only  a  single  long  garment,  a  chula, 
that  came  to  above  the  ankles  and  had  no  sleeves. 
Some  forest  flower  was  in  her  black  hair,  and 
she  was  a  beauty,  not  by  any  of  the  savage  stand- 


2o6  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

ards  alone  or  by  the  easy  imagination  that  gives 
some  youthful  savages  a  certain  attractiveness 
as  a  matter  of  pure  contrast,  but  she  was  beauti^ 
ful  by  any  of  those  standards  that  obtain  in  our 
home  countries.  Along  with  her  regular  fea- 
tures, delicate  nostrils,  soft  eyes,  and  regular, 
curving  lips,  with  a  soft,  light-coppery,  tawny 
complexion,  so  soft  and  light  that  the  color  came 
and  went  in  her  cheeks  like  a  fresh-blown  de- 
butante, she  had  the  carriage  of  a  queen,  though 
that  was  nothing  to  a  race  of  women  who  carry 
burdens  on  their  heads  from  babyhood  and  who 
can  swim  like  otters.  I  saw  later  very  many 
Lecco  women,  and  while  all  were  superior  in 
type  to  those  of  the  neighboring  tribes,  there 
was  but  one  that  could  compare  with  the  fea- 
tures of  this  first  Lecco  girl  and  the  two  might 
have  been  sisters,  so  close  was  the  type  of  their 
beauty. 

More  Lecco  homes  appeared,  and  at  each 
some  one  of  the  crew  received  his  new  stock  of 
clean  clothes  and  packed  his  pouch  with  them. 
Then  Guanai  appeared,  or  rather  we  stopped 
under  the  river  bank  close  by,  for  the  straggling 
collection  of  huts  lies  some  distance  back  from 
the  river.     A  few  rubber-traders,  half-breeds, 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO   MAPIRI    207 

and  Cholos  live  here,  and  control  the  Leccos. 
Most  of  them,  when  I  was  there,  were  refugees 
from  the  other  side  of  the  Andes,  and  here  are 
beyond  the  reach  of  the  Bolivian  authorities. 
Once  in  a  while  some  one  of  them  is  caught  and 
taken  out  in  chains  by  the  soldiers  sent  in  for  the 
special  purpose,  but  as  a  rule  that  followed  only 
as  the  result  of  internecine  difficulty  and  result- 
ing treachery. 

The  head  man  came  down  to  the  bank  to  meet 
us  with  his  neck  stiff  and  awkward  in  some 
home-made  bandage.  He  was  still  half-drunk, 
but  very  hospitable.  The  night  before,  it  seems, 
there  had  been  a  fight,  and  when  the  candles 
were  stamped  out  in  the  little  hut  it  became  very 
confusing,  he  explained,  hence  the  stab  in  the 
neck  and  somewhere  a  couple  of  men  were  nurs- 
ing bullet-holes.  We  handed  over  the  few  let- 
ters from  the  Cholo  at  Mapiri,  and  he  was  eager 
to  get  news  of  La  Paz  and  the  outside  world. 
For  years  he  had  lived  here,  a  refugee  from  the 
law,  and  unmolested;  some  day  he  will  meet 
with  as  sudden  a  death  as  he  had  often  bestowed, 
and  another  head  man  will  fill  his  uncertain 
shoes.  A  torn  straw  hat,  cotton  shirt,  and  Lecco 
trousers  were  his  sole  costume,  and  he  hunts 


2o8  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

barefoot  and  runs  the  river  as  readily  as  any  of 
the  Lecco  tribesmen. 

Below  Guanai  the  Rio  Mapirl  is  reinforced 
by  the  Rio  Coroico  and  the  Rio  Tipuani,  clear, 
cold  streams.  All  along  little  brooks  and  moun- 
tain torrents  have  also  been  adding  to  the 
volumes  of  our  river,  so  that  it  had  grown  to  a 
goodly  size.  Below  this  settlement  of  Guanai 
were  the  worst  and  most  dangerous  passages. 
Any  of  the  rapids  are  bad,  but  they  are  less  to  be 
feared  than  the  great  whirlpools  that  form  be- 
low each  one  of  them.  It  is  these  remolinos  that 
are  more  likely  to  catch  the  rafts  and  tear  them 
apart.  The  rough  water  of  the  rapid  can  be 
watched,  and  the  callapo  can  be  kept  head  on 
in  the  current,  but  below  there  are  no  means  of 
judging  when  a  whirling  vortex  will  form  that 
will  drag  the  callapo  under  and  perhaps  later 
throw  it  out  farther  down  in  scattered  frag- 
ments. 

For  fifty  miles  the  hills  crowded  in,  and  there 
were  only  rarely  any  open,  slower  reaches  of 
river.  Huge  masses  of  rock  had  broken  from 
above  and  hurled  themselves  into  the  gorges, 
where  the  current  was  choked  in  masses  of  high- 
flung  spray.    The  Leccos  know  that  on  one  cer- 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO  MAPIRI    209 


BUT  IT  IS  THOSS  PARTS  OF  TH^  RIVER  THAT  THB  L^CCOS  :PAIRI.Y 
I,OVE. 

tain  side  of  these  rocks  there  was  disaster  and 
with  their  heavy  paddles  they  pried  the  raft  in 
the  proper  currents.  At  first  the  water  was 
smooth — smoother  than  in  the  broader  reaches 
— but  the  banks  moved  past  more  swiftly,  and 
from  out  of  the  water  itself  came  a  little  rattling, 
crackling  sound — the  sound  of  boulders  on  the 


2IO  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

river-bed  crashing  together  as  they  were  swept 
down-stream.  Then  the  surface  of  the  river 
broke  up  in  snapping  little  ripples,  while  under 
our  feet  there  was  the  feel  of  the  raft  straining 
in  the  eddying  thrust  of  the  current.  But  it  is 
these  parts  of  the  river  that  the  Leccos  fairly 
love;  their  eyes  sparkled  and  they  laughed  and 
chattered  with  excitement. 

Ahead  there  was  a  roaring  smother  of  foam, 
which  curled  back  in  a  crested  wave;  the 
paddles,  with  the  callapo  snouts  as  a  fulcrum, 
swung  the  course  to  the  right,  and  a  second  later 
there  came  a  rush  and  a  crash  as  a  mass  of  boil- 
ing water  climbed  over  the  starboard  cargo  and 
we  careened  until  the  crew  on  the  lower  side 
were  breast-deep  in  the  smother.  It  was  only 
for  a  second,  and  the  raft  drifted  out  among  the 
eddying  whirlpools  that  formed  below.  One,  a 
fairly  small  one,  caught  us  at  the  stern,  and  we 
were  drawn  under  as  if  caught  by  a  submarine 
claw;  the  waters  rose  to  the  breasts  of  the  stern 
crew,  while  they,  braced  against  their  paddles, 
grinned  back  at  us  cheerfully.  Then  the  vor- 
tex broke  and  very  slowly  the  cargo  rose 
dripping  into  view. 

Every  rapid,  bend,  or  cataract  in  this  part  has 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO   MAPIRI    211 


its  name,  an  honor  denied  the 
distances  up  the  Mapiri  of  the 
day  before.    We   passed  the 
Conseli,  and  entered  Kirkana 
— the  spelling  is   phonetic — 
a  magnified  mountain  brook 
that  boiled  through  the  tor- 
tuous    passages     for     miles. 
There  was  not  a  mile  that  did 
not  have  its  channel  choked 
with   rock,    through 
which  we  shot  in  a 
smother  of  foam  like 
a  South  Sea  Islander 
on    his     surf-boardJ 
Then  came  a  canon, 
with  walls   of  gray 
rock  on  which  were 
stains     o  r     symbols 
that  in  a  rough  way  a  rubber  picker. 

suggested  some  of  the  old  Inca  forms,  to  which 
the  Leccos  have  given  the  name  of  "  Devil- 
Painted  "  rapids.  Beyond  lie  the  rapids  of  the 
"  Bad  Waters,"  and  then  the  Ysipuri  Rapids, 
where  there  was  a  large  rubber  barraca  in  charge 
of  an  English  superintendent. 


212  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

The  night's  camp  was  at  Ysipuri,  a  rubber 
barraca  that  was  complaining  bitterly  at  the 
time  that  it  was  overstocked  with  marmalade 
and  snakes.  If  you  have  never  lived  on  mar- 
malade for  six  months  hand-running  when 
transportation  is  practically  cut  off — and  a 
cheap,  tin-can  marmalade  made  mainly  for  the 
calloused  tongues  of  a  half-breed  trade  at  that — ' 
you  do  not  know  what  real  desolation  in  a 
rubber  jungle  is.  Also  it  was  the  hatching  sea- 
son for  snakes  and  there  was  never  a  day,  even 
scarcely  an  hour,  when  a  few  feet  or  less  of  snake 
was  not  being  untangled  from  the  cane  walled 
thatch  of  the  house.  Two  were  fished  out  of  the 
kettles  in  the  cook-shack  as  the  Lecco  lady-cook 
started  to  prepare  the  midday  breakfast  and  even 
the  ordinary  security  of  a  hammock  was  no 
guarantee  against  them.  Rarely  were  they  big, 
some  were  mere  babies  and  others  but  adolescent 
boas ;  one  of  eight  feet  in  length  was  killed,  but 
this  was  an  exception,  for  the  general  run  were 
juveniles  of  from  a  few  inches  to  two  or  three 
feet.  Also  eight  feet  was  not  a  big  snake,  not  in 
a  country  where  you  can  hear  tales  of  thirty  and 
forty  foot  reptiles. 

The  chief  in  this  barraca  was  a  white  man ;  he 


DRIFTING  DOWN  RIO   MAPIRI     213 

had  a  well  kept  place  with  its  out-buildings  and 
little  Indian  quarters  laid  out  with  some  system. 
There  was  sweet  corn,  real  sweet  corn,  and  not 
the  choclo  of  the  Aymara,  an  unripe  ear  of  com- 
mon field  corn;  melons,  yuccas,  bananas,  and  the 
best  attempt  at  a  garden  that  could  be  made  in 
a  tropical  jungle.  Also,  before  dinner  that 
evening  a  Lecco  boy  came  in  with  a  log  of  wood 
which  he  dumped  in  the  cook  house;  with  a 
machete  he  chopped  it  up — for  firewood  as  I 
thought.  Presently,  at  dinner  there  was  a  most 
delicious  vegetable,  hot  and  looking  like  cold- 
slaw  or  sourkrout.  It  was  my  old  friend  the  log 
of  wood,  the  bud  of  the  cabbage  palm  chopped 
by  a  rubber  picker  somewhere  out  in  the  forest. 


CHAPTER  XV 

SHOOTING  THE  RATAMA 

AT  daybreak  we  left  the  Ysipuri  barraca 
and  emptying  our  rifles  in  salute  to  the 
Englishman's  Winchester,  we  started  on 
for  the  next  rapids,  the  greatest  rapids  on  the 
river — the  Ratama. 

Two  miles  above  the  Ratama  the  walls  of  the 
gorge  began  to  close  in  steep  cliffs.  Here  and 
there  shrubs  clung  on  little  niches,  while  from 
the  high  edges  long  vines  hung  down  and  were 
whipped  taut  in  the  swift,  glassy  current  below. 
The  air  began  to  cool  in  the  deep  shadows,  and 
there  was  a  damp  chill  in  it  like  the  breath  from 
a  cavern.  The  Leccos  were  not  chattering  now, 
for  this  place  may  on  any  trip  prove  to  be  seri- 
ous, and  the  silence  of  the  smooth  drifting  was 
only  broken  by  an  occasional  kingfisher,  which 
clattered  by  like  a  flying  watchman's  rattle. 
Slowly  a  dull  roaring,  echoing  from  the  dis- 
214 


SHOOTING   THE   RAT  AM  A      215 

tance,  steadily  obtruded  itself;  the  current  was 
still  glassy,  but  as  it  moved  it  snapped  against 
the  walls  of  the  canon  in  angry  ripples.  Every 
Lecco  in  the  crew  was  poised,  with  his  paddle, 
as  tense  as  a  strung  bow.  Now  we  knew  who 
was  the  captain  of  the  crew.  It  was  the  forward 
Lecco  on  the  right;  he  was  the  only  one  who 
had  anything  to  say.  It  was  no  childish  joking 
now;  there  were  commands.  Occasionally  he 
grunted  his  order,  and  the  paddles  dipped  as 
they  held  the  raft  true,  bow  on,  in  the  middle  of 
the  current.  With  a  grand  sweep  we  swung 
round  a  bend  between  the  walls  of  rock  and 
there  far  ahead  the  white  waves  of  the  Ratama 
were  snapping  like  great  fangs  against  the  dusk 
of  the  canon,  while  above  them  hung  a  heavy 
mist  that  blurred  the  outlines  of  the  gorge  be- 
yond. 

The  callapo  increased  its  speed;  the  Ratama 
seemed  to  be  springing  toward  us  with  each 
leaping  wave ;  the  roaring  water  deepened,  and 
the  voices  were  drowned.  The  Lecco  captain 
dipped  his  paddle,  and  the  rest  followed  the 
signal,  and  gently  the  callapo  was  held  true, 
with  the  three  upturned  snouts  headed  straight 
for  the  foaming  center.    The  cliffs  had  closed 


2i6  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

in  like  the  walls  of  a  corridor,  and  they  flew 
past  like  the  flickering  film  of  a  moving-pic- 
ture; the  spray  from  the  trailing  vines  was 
whipped  in  our  faces  and  floated  upward  to 
form  rainbows  in  the  slanting  sunlight  high 
overhead.  Then  for  a  second  we  seemed  to 
pause  on  the  edge  of  a  long  slide  of  polished 
water,  the  edge  of  the  cataract. 

The  Leccos  crouched  for  the  shock,  and  we 
could  fairly  feel  their  toes  gripping  the  sub- 
merged callapo  logs,  while  their  paddles  were 
poised  above  their  heads.  Then  came  the  brief 
coast  down  the  smooth  water  and  the  plunge 
into  the  great  wave  that  loomed  above  our 
heads,  only  to  break  with  a  drenching  roar 
over  us  and  the  lashed  freight.  The  Leccos 
dropped  on  their  knees,  gripping  a  hold  as  best 
they  might;  their  eyes  glittered  with  excitement, 
and  I  could  see  their  wide-open  mouths  in  a  yell 
of  wild  joy,  though  every  sound  was  drowned 
in  the  crash  and  roar  of  waters.  The  paddles 
swung  in  powerful  circles,  and  at  each  dip  the 
paddlers  went  out  of  sight,  head  and  shoulders 
in  the  smother  of  foam. 

The  water  was  above  my  waist,  and  some- 
where below  the  surface  I  was  hanging  on  to 


Running  the  Rapids  of  tiie  Ratama 


PAGE    2  I  7 


SHOOTING    THE   RATAMA      217 

the  cargo  lashings,  with  my  feet  braced  against 
the  logs.  Under  the  boiling  smother  of  foam 
I  could  feel  the  callapo  writhe  and  twist  in  the 
strain;  a  keg  broke  loose,  and  a  Lecco  lost  his 
paddle  in  recovering  it.  His  paddle  was  of  no 
consequence,  for  he  could  whittle  another,  and 
he  fondly  believed  the  keg  held  the  beloved 
alcohol — canassa — though  he  was  wrong,  for  it 
held  nothing  but  pickled  beef,  and  worthless,  as 
I  later  found. 

Sometimes  a  Lecco's  shoulder  would  rise 
above  the  boiling  smother,  with  the  brown 
muscles  playing  in  hard  knots;  sometimes  we 
would  slew  side  on  to  the  current,  and  no  power 
could  hold  us  straight  until  a  bursting  wave 
would  throw  us  back;  sometimes  for  an  instant 
the  dripping  snouts  of  the  callapo  would  be 
flung  high  in  the  air  and  fall  back  with  a  crash 
that  made  itself  heard  above  the  roar,  and  the 
raft  would  quiver  and  strain  with  the  impact. 
One  saw  nothing;  we  might  have  been  standing 
still.  There  was  nothing  but  the  lashing  sting 
of  the  whirling  spray  and  the  thunder  of  the 
cataract.  Then,  in  an  instant,  the  roar  and  the 
tumult  were  behind,  the  waves  calmed,  and  the 
callapo  shot  out  into  the  calmer  waters  below, 


2i8  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

where  the  whirlpools  and  eddies  shifted  and 
coiled. 

Vortices  into  which  one  might  lower  a  barrel 
without  wetting  it  whirled  lazily  past  within 
paddle-reach,  and  sometimes  one  would  sud- 
denly form  ahead  and  the  Leccos  would  watch 
them  intently  as  to  their  possible  direction,  and 
then  paddle  to  shift  our  course.  These  they  can 
generally  avoid.  It  is  when  one  forms  or  sud- 
denly comes  up  from  underneath  that  there  is 
danger.  A  few  did  catch  us  this  way  and  the 
Leccos  would  stand  with  braced  feet,  reading  by 
the  straining  logs  the  possible  strength  of  the 
vortex,  and  the  callapo  would  grind  and  slowly 
sink,  until  by  sheer  mass  it  broke  the  force  of  the 
whirl.  Often  we  would  go  down  by  the  stern 
until  the  after  Leccos  kept  only  their  heads 
above  water,  and  even  we,  farther  forward, 
would  be  submerged  up  to  our  shoulders. 
There  was  nothing  to  do  but  wait  until  the  vor- 
tex broke  of  itself. 

In  the  Ratama  the  roar  and  excitement 
drowned  any  emotion,  but  this  was  slowly  wait- 
ing in  uncertainty  and  speculating  on  how  far 
one  could  really  swim  before  being  drawn  un- 
der like  a  chip.     Not  far,  that  was  certain,  and 


SHOOTING   THE   RATAMA      219 

the  Leccos  watched  this  shifting,  coiling  pas- 
sage in  a  silent  gravity  that  they  had  shown  no- 
where else  on  the  river.  It  is  the  breaking  up 
of  the  logs  and  cargo  that  make  the  danger,  at 
least  to  the  Lecco — greater  than  the  power  of 
the  river  itself — and  a  white  man  would  have 
no  chance. 

From  the  Ratama  the  river  and  the  country 
back  of  it  opened  out,  and  the  last  of  the  eastern 
Andean  foot-hills  were  almost  passed.  A  few 
more  rapids  were  left — the  Nube,  the  Inca- 
guarra,  the  Beyo,  and  the  Bala — but  after  the 
Ratama  they  dwindled  to  harmless  riffles.  The 
Beyo  Canons  resound  with  a  deafening  roar,  but 
it  is  from  the  thousands  of  macaws  that  have 
their  nests  in  the  soft  sandstone  cliffs,  and  it  is 
their  clatter  that  carries  for  miles  in  the  soft 
evening  airs. 

Presently  the  chief  of  the  Lecco  crew  chat- 
tered with  the  others.  They  argued  each  ac- 
cording to  his  recollection,  for  down  somewhere 
on  this  stretch  of  the  river — it  was  the  River 
Kaka  now  since  being  joined  by  the  River  Tip- 
uani  and  the  Coroico  River,  mountain  torrents 
both — there  was  an  old  camp  that  was  our  ob- 
jective.    The  jungle  had  long  since  wiped  out 


220  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

every  trace  and  there  was  nothing  to  depend 
upon  but  the  memory  of  the  Leccos.  As  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  there  probably  is  nothing  that  could 
be  more  reliable;  it  is  the  one  thing  they  know, 
is  this  river,  and  every  turn,  every  eddy,  every 
tree  or  drooping  vine  along  the  banks  is  marked 
down  in  their  primitive  minds  with  the  vivid- 
ness of  painted  signs.  The  callapos  strung  out 
each  in  the  wake  of  the  other  drifting  around  a 
long  turn  of  smooth,  swift  water.  The  chief 
grunted,  the  crew  clattered  and  grunted  back  in 
obvious  affirmation.  The  paddles  dipped,  and 
from  the  following  callapos  came  a  yell  as  they, 
too,  began  to  splash  and  pry  their  way  out  of  the 
current.  One  after  the  other  they  swung  round 
and  bumped  into  shallow  water  on  the  heavy 
gravel  of  a  playa ;  beyond  rose  a  steep  bank  over- 
grown with  masses  of  creeper  and  jungle. 

The  Leccos  chopped  a  way  in  with  their 
machetes,  and  with  a  grunt  a  Lecco  announced 
a  find.  There  was  a  tent  peg,  a  broken  kettle,  a 
broken  bottle  neck,  and  a  bit  of  rope.  It  was 
the  proof  of  the  site  of  the  previous  camp  in  its 
exact  location.  Five  minutes  later  the  lashings 
were  off  the  freight  and  a  splashing  line  of  In- 
dians and  Cholos  were  bringing  the  freight 


SHOOTING   THE   RATAMA      221 

ashore.  Here  was  to  be  established  the  per- 
manent camp ;  the  long  journey  from  the  coast 
had  reached  its  goal. 

The  Leccos  and  the  Cholo  workmen  were  still 
splashing  through  the  muddy  shallows  from  the 
grounded  callapos  packing  the  freight  for  the 
camp  when  Agamemnon  announced  himself  as 
cook.  Before  this  moment  he  had  idly  oc- 
cupied himself  as  valet,  butler,  laundress — at 
least  since  leaving  La  Paz — faithful  adviser, 
major  domo,  village  gossip,  and  occasionally 
the  village  drunkard.  And  now  when  he  an- 
nounced himself  as  cook  no  husk  of  humility 
could  conceal  the  fact  that  he  regarded  all  other 
cook  possibilities  in  that  camp  on  the  Rio  Kaka 
with  a  scornful  contempt. 

Later  it  developed  that  at  this  particular  time 
his  sole  knowledge  of  cooking  was  confined  to 
an  ability  to  make  guava  jelly,  an  accomplish- 
ment which,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  we  were 
somewhere  around  five  hundred  miles  by  trail 
and  raft  from  civilization,  was  of  no  service  at 
the  moment. 

The  difficulty  over  the  cook  situation  had 
arisen  suddenly  in  the  first  hour  of  making 
camp.     Back  in   Mapiri   there  was   a   certain 


222  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

fat  little  Cholo  who  had  sewed  a  strip  of 
red  flannel  down  his  trouser  legs  in  sign  of 
the  fact  that  under  some  circumstances  he 
was  the  Mapiri  police  force;  what  these  cir- 
cumstances might  be  never  developed  for  dur- 
ing our  long  wait  he  was  busy  at  nothing 
more  official  than  taking  care  of  the  sugar-cane 
distillery  that  belonged  to  the  intendente.  Be- 
fore that,  rumor  had  it,  he  had  taught  school  in 
Guanai  down  the  river  with  a  row  of  empty 
canassa  bottles  by  means  of  which  he  illustrated 
addition  and  subtraction.  This  was  as  far  as 
the  school  went;  with  that  course  completed,  it 
issued  its  diploma.  This  little  Cholo  urged 
himself  as  cook  and,  as  we  needed  a  cook,  he 
was  added.  As  it  turned  out  he  was  probably 
the  only  man  in  Bolivia  who  could  not  cook,  or 
at  any  rate  the  only  one  who  had  never  passed 
the  stage  of  being  able  to  boil  water. 

When  the  callapos  swung  in  to  the  playa  and 
grounded  on  the  shallow  beach  the  cook  started 
to  get  his  first  meal.  The  water  was  brought 
to  a  boil  successfully  in  a  large  kettle  between 
two  logs.  Presently  it  began  to  exude  half- 
cooked  rice  and  cheerfully  the  fat  Cholo  added 
another  kettle  to  hold  the  overflow.     Presently, 


SHOOTING   THE   RATAMA      223 

also,  both  kettles  began  to  exude  half-cooked 
rice  and  two  more  kettles  were  added  to  the 
logs.  Once  again  the  pots  seethed  and  frothed 
and  again  came  forth  the  overflow  of  half- 
cooked  rice,  still  swelling,  from  four  intermin- 
able geysers. 

Dully  the  Cholo  beat  at  it  with  an  iron  spoon 
and  the  Leccos  grinned  at  him  as  they  filled 
their  little  pots  with  the  overflow.  Heaven 
alone  knows  how  much  rice  the  cook  started 
with,  but  in  the  end  half  the  fire  was  drowned 
out,  every  Lecco  had  his  little  pot  of  half  rgw 
rice,  a  row  of  big  jungle  leaves  had  each  their 
little  mound  of  rice  alongside  the  fire  log,  and 
the  hot  tropic  air  was  drifting  sluggishly  with 
the  odor  of  burnt  rice.  And  every  pot  and 
kettle  in  camp  held  remnants  of  the  salvage. 
Therefore,  it  was  that  Agamemnon  became 
cook. 


CHAPTER   XVI 

OPENING  UP  THE  JUNGLE 

AMONG  the  Cholo  workmen  it  developed 
that  each  preferred  to  cook  for  himself 
with  his  own  little  pot  and  over  his  own 
individual  fire.  It  was  too  great  a  waste  of 
time  and  energy  to  have  eighteen  men  building 
eighteen  fires  three  times  a  day  in  order  to  cook 
their  fifty-four  meals.  So  a  compromise  was  ef- 
fected. The  original  Cholo  cook — who  was 
good  for  nothing^ — kept  up  one  long  fire  on 
which  the  row  of  pots  simmered.  After  each 
meal  enough  would  be  issued  to  each  pot  owner 
for  the  next  meal.  In  the  early  morning  the 
general  day's  rations  were  issued.  The  Cholos 
wrapped  them  in  smudgy  bandanas  and  laid 
them  away  beneath  their  bunks — their  bunk 
shack  of  cane,  charo,  being  the  first  thing  at- 
tended to — and  then  traded  back  and  forth  ac- 
cording to  fancy,  a  little  rice  for  a  gristly  shin 

224 


OPENING    UP   THE   JUNGLE      225 

bone  of  chalona,  or  some  chancaca  for  a  bit  of 
coffee  or  chuiio.  Coca  formed  a  regular  part 
of  the  ration  and  was  regularly  used  by  all  the 
workmen. 

Agamemnon  as  a  cook  developed  famously. 
As  to  results  one  could  never  properly  place  the 
blame  upon  him.  With  the  exact  and  reten- 
tive memory  of  the  utterly  illiterate  he  followed 
directions  with  absolute  fidelity.  He  was  of  the 
same  family  as  that  famous  cook  who,  after  hav- 
ing been  instructed  by  the  missus  in  cake-mak- 
ing, invariably  threw  away  the  first  two  eggs  be- 
cause in  the  original  effort  the  first  two  had 
proved  to  be  undesirable  citizens.  Agamemnon 
was  of  this  order,  yet  he  never  failed  to  throw  in 
all  the  frills  of  table  service  he  could  think  of. 
This  came  from  his  days  of  stewarding  on  the 
Pacific  coasters. 

Every  morning  he  appeared  with  a  box  lid 
for  a  tray  set  forth  in  fresh  green  jungle  leaves 
and  on  it  a  species  of  muffin  that  he  had  de- 
veloped or  the  boiled  green  platanos  that  took 
the  place  of  bread,  a  tin  can  of  jam,  or  some 
turtle  eggs  if  we  had  been  lucky  in  a  trade  with 
some  passing  batalon  of  Leccos.  Coffee  he 
served  with  a  flourish  and  from  his  camp  fire 


226  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

below  the  bank  on  which  our  tent  was  pitched 
he  would  bring  up  a  bucket  of  hot  water  with 
which  he  could  keep  a  continual  service  of  clean 
camp  plates. 

In  the  intervals  at  meals  he  stood  back  and 
fanned  off  the  wild  bees  that  flocked  to  the  jam 
and  condensed  milk  tins.  Two  little  holes 
pricked  in  the  milk  tins  guarded  them,  but  with 
the  jam  it  was  different;  often  a  half  tin  of  jam 
had  to  be  thrown  away,  the  contents  solid  with 
reckless,  greedy  bee  suicides.  They  would  light 
on  the  jam  while  it  was  on  the  way  to  your  lips 
or  stow  away  on  the  under  side  of  the  jammed 
muffin,  compelling  the  utmost  vigilance  on  the 
penalty  of  a  diet  of  raw  bees.  With  all  the  reck- 
less handling  they  received,  not  one  of  them 
stung. 

It  was  the  ant  that  was  the  Irritable,  hot- 
weaponed  party  who  went  out  a-jousting  from 
the  sheer  lust  of  battle.  They  were  infinite  in 
variety  from  the  sluggish  white-ant  that  left  the 
table  a  hollow  shell  of  sawdust  on  up  to  the  leaf- 
cutters  and  army  ants  to  whom  nothing  was  so 
precious  as  the  straight  line  in  which  they  were 
going.  But  the  worst,  the  most  vicious  and  ac- 
cursed was  the  large  black  variety  one  of  whom 


OPENING    UP   THE   JUNGLE      227 

made  a  murderous  attack  upon  me  in  the  dark- 
ness. 

He  IS  nearly  an  inch  in  length.  To  the  Lec- 
cos  he  is  known  as  buno-isti  and  they  also  assert 
that  he  lives  in  very  small  communities  in  holes 
in  the  ground,  not  building  the  ordinary  nests. 
Agamemnon  had  been  stung  and  had  promptly, 
darkey  fashion,  tied  a  rag  around  his  head  and 
stayed  in  his  tent  all  night  groaning.  A  Cholo 
boy  was  stung  and  he  too  tied  a  rag  around  his 
head  and  groaned  throughout  the  night.  It 
seemed  absurd  for  a  mere  sting  to  have  that  ef- 
fect and  I  looked  upon  them  with  a  proper 
scorn.  I  have  been  stung  by  hornets  and  scor- 
pions and  the  latter  seemed  to  me,  at  the  time, 
as  the  ultimate  of  all  stinging  sensations.  I  was 
wrong. 

For  some  reason  these  buno-istis  seemed  to 
have  a  love  for  passing  themselves  in  review  up 
the  guy  rope,  along  the  ridge  pole,  and  down 
the  other  guy  rope  of  the  tent.  By  observing  I 
noticed  that  no  sooner  did  the  buno-isti  reach 
the  bottom  of  the  guy  rope  than  he  started  back 
to  the  front  guy  and  began  another  tour.  One 
evening  I  stepped  out  in  the  darkness,  my  foot 
caught  on  a  root  and  I  stumbled ;  I  clutched  for 


228  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

the  guy  rope  to  save  myself  and  the  instant  my 
hand  touched  the  forefinger  connected  with  a 
high  voltage  current  that  gave  all  the  senations 
of  a  red-hot  sausage  grinder.  I  had  caught  a 
buno-isti  on  his  way  up  the  guy  rope. 

A  delayed  lantern  revealed  a  crippled  buno- 
isti  and  a  finger  with  an  almost  invisible  sting 
on  the  first  joint.  There  was  no  swelling  nor 
did  any  follow  at  any  time.  Yet  the  pain  was 
intense;  I  could  feel  it  spreading  from  the  finger 
to  the  hand  and  then,  slowly  with  an  acute  tor- 
ture that  brought  no  relieving  numbness  up  to 
the  shoulder.  There  it  halted.  But  for  hours, 
as  the  camp  watch  showed,  there  was  no  sleep 
possible,  not  until  the  exhaustion  from  pain 
paved  the  way.  For  three  days  the  effects 
lingered  in  the  form  of  a  bruised  sensitiveness 
that  made  that  arm  all  but  useless.  A  scorpion 
sting  is  a  gentle  tickle  compared  with  the  buno- 
isti. 

Slowly  the  camp  grew.  A  patch  of  jungle 
was  cleared  on  the  high  bank  above  the  river  be- 
yond the  reach  of  any  sudden  freshet.  In  the 
early  days  of  the  camp  one  of  these  freshets  de- 
scended from  the  Andean  foot-hills  and  before 
the  last  of  the  outfit  had  been  carried  to  the  high 


OPENING    UP    THE   JUNGLE      229 

bank  the  Cholos  were  struggling  in  a  current  up 
to  their  belts  or  portaging  by  the  aid  of  poles 
held  out  to  steady  them.  Where  the  first  hasty 
camp  had  been  was  a  torrent  of  muddy  waters 
and  a  tiny  island  cut  ofif  from  us  by  a  creek  torn 
in  the  bank  by  the  flooding  river.  The  water 
rose  five  inches  a  minute  for  about  eight  feet 
and  then  slowly  went  back  during  the  night  a 
few  inches. 

For  something  like  eleven  miles  down  this 
river  there  was  placer  gold.  Wherever  a  sand- 
bar or  a  sand  bank  showed  it  was  of  black,  gold- 
bearing  sand.  Anywhere  you  washed  you  got  a 
trace  or  color  in  the  pan  and  sometimes  thirty 
or  forty  bright  flecks  of  gold  glittering  against 
the  rusty  iron  bottom.  But  with  that  current, 
the  uncertain  rise  of  freshets,  the  distance  from 
civilization  and  main  supplies,  only  an  Indian 
could  wash  out  dirt  and  make  a  living  at  it.  The 
plan  was  to  prospect  the  placer  area  extensively 
and  establish  a  basis  for  the  permanent  working 
camp  that  was  to  follow.  The  gold  was  there, 
but  how  deep  to  bed  rock  or  hard  pan,  whether 
it  were  best  to  work  by  dredge  or  shaft  or  open 
workings,  these  were  the  questions  that  had 
arisen  back  in  the  world  of  civilization  and  were 


230  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

solved  on  the  basis  of  the  results  of  this  first 
camp. 

From  the  bank  at  the  water's  edge  there 
stretched  back  a  mass  of  matted  jungle,  creepers, 
vines,  and  underbrush  and  above,  a  mass  of  vines 
that  tangled  the  treetops  in  great  patches  of 
aerial  islands.  Paths  had  to  be  cut,  some  kind 
of  a  working  map  made,  the  natural  difficulties 
and  conditions  set  forth,  and  the  beginnings  of 
the  permanent  camp  put  in  form. 

The  eighteen  men  were  swallowed  up  in  the 
jungle.  The  clearing  was  scarcely  made  and 
burned  before  the  jungle  was  again  closing  in 
and  rising  from  the  ground  like  sown  dragon's 
teeth.  And  slowly  progress  was  made  and  up 
and  down  the  river  the  camp  became  known  and 
voyaging  rubber  traders  and  crews  stopped  as  at 
a  port  of  call. 

One  expedition  passed  the  midday  breakfast 
with  us.  Its  head  was  an  Englishman,  a  wiry, 
frontier  hardened  man  who  was  on  a  punitive 
expedition  at  the  head  of  his  men,  rubber  pick- 
ers, balseros,  and  headquarters  men  from  his 
barraca.  Somewhere  in  the  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  acres  that  represented  the  rubber 
domain  of  which  he  was  chief  there  was  a  bound- 


OPENING   UP   THE   JUNGLE      231 

ary  dispute.  His  trees  had  been  raided  and 
here,  like  a  feudal  baron — or  rather  like  a 
salaried  feudal  baron,  the  fief  of  a  plush- 
cushioned,  rocking  chair  lord  of  a  board  of  di- 
rectors the  half  of  seven  seas  away — he  was  at 
the  head  of  his  two  callapos  and  fourteen  Win- 
chesters and  a  scattering  of  twenty  bore,  miser- 
able trade-guns  with  their  trade  powder  in 
gaudy  red  tins  and  a  month's  rations  for  the 
expedition. 

Again,  a  couple  of  Englishmen  who  had 
drifted  down  to  Rurrenabaque,  the  last  settle- 
ment of  the  frontier  from  this  side  of  the  con- 
tinent, stopped  as  they  were  slowly  poling  up 
the  river  with  a  couple  of  new  dugouts.  Their 
crew  was  of  Tacana  Indians  and  these  dugouts 
were  the  first  known  on  the  river.  In  effect 
these  men  had  independently  invented  the 
"  whaleback." 

The  endless  series  of  rapids  made  the  callapo 
with  its  baggage  platform  a  poor  freighter. 
In  their  mahogany  dugouts  they  had  a  series  of 
deck  hatches  that,  when  the  cargo  was  on  board, 
were  bolted  down  over  rubber  gaskets — rubber 
pure  as  it  came  from  the  tree  and  spread  with  a 
bundle  of  parrot  feathers  over  a  sheet  of  coarse 


232  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

muslin  and  then  smoked  in  a  hot,  blue  palm 
smoke.  With  a  couple  of  these  dugouts  lashed 
together  they  proposed  to  shoot  the  little  canons 
and  the  Nube,  the  Incaguarra,  the  Diablo  Pin- 
tado and  the  Ratama.  And  they  did,  too, 
dropping  paddles  and  clinging  with  tooth  and 
claw  to  the  bare  wet  decks  on  which  they  had 
omitted  to  put  cleats  or  rope  holds.  But  it  was 
an  eminently  successful  venture  and  they  slowly 
chipped  away  with  adze  and  ax  until  on  their 
next  trip  they  had  a  fleet  of  seven  dugouts,  each 
some  thirty-five  to  forty  feet  in  length,  and  from 
a  single  log  of  caobo,  mahogany,  or  palo-maria, 
with  which  they  could  run  the  river  in  either 
the  dry  or  wet  season.  With  balsas  and  cal- 
lapos,  as  our  long  delay  in  Mapiri  showed,  only 
under  the  pressure  of  emergency  was  it  possible 
to  get  up  the  river. 

As  the  work  progressed  It  became  evident 
that  our  original  outfit  was  not  sufficient  to 
make  any  adequate  preliminary  development. 
It  was  not  possible  to  get  to  bedrock  without 
some  machinery,  a  pump,  and  some  means  of 
sawing  lumber  for  sheet  piling.  The  Cholos 
were  perfectly  useless  at  whip-sawing  a  log. 
We  tried  them  and  the  work  was  too  gruelling. 


OPENING    UP    THE   JUNGLE      233 

They  were  curiously  inefficient  in  any  line  out- 
side of  their  narrow  experience.  A  block  and 
tackle  was  an  unsolved  riddle,  although  they 
recognized  its  power.  They  would  take  it 
along  cheerfully  in  the  morning  and  then  later 
send  for  some  one  to  come  up  and  work  it;  they 
could  never  fathom  which  rope  to  pull.  Main 
strength  and  awkwardness  were  their  reliance 
and  when  these  failed — carramba,  what  more 
could  be  done? 

According  to  the  custom  of  the  montafia  they 
had  been  contracted  for  six  months  before  a 
judge,  an  intendente,  and  amid  all  sorts  of 
mystic  ceremonials  of  red  tape  without  which 
Bolivian  law  and  custom  looks  askance.  Five 
weeks  had  been  a  dead  loss  in  Mapiri  and  two 
weeks  more  for  gathering  them  and  the  time  of 
actual  transportation  and  then  almost  two 
months  of  work  in  camp  came  perilously  near 
the  expiration  of  their  contracts  when  it  was 
considered  necessary  to  bring  in  a  new  gang. 
These  were  hungry  to  get  back  to  their  little 
villages  and  join  in  the  high  class  carnivals  and 
drunken  dances.  Some  of  the  Cholos  were 
worthless,  while  others  would  come  back  again 
after  a  rest  on  the  other  side  of  the  Andes, 


234  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Segorrondo,  the  squat  little  drunkard,  was  one 
of  the  best  men  in  the  gang  and  he  had  added  a 
new  adornment  to  his  peculiarly  unattractive 
exterior.  In  a  fight  with  the  major  domo  he 
had  had  his  head  laid  open  with  a  machete  from 
over  his  right  eye  to  almost  the  back  of  his 
neck.  It  was  a  mere  scalp  wound,  fortunately 
for  Segorrondo  as  the  machete  glanced. 

It  took  six  men  to  hold  him  while  he  was 
stitched  up  with  six  stitches.  Beauty  was  to 
him  no  object  compared  with  the  pain  of  stitch- 
ing, and  when  our  surgical  job  was  over,  the  ef- 
fect of  only  six  irregular  stitches  in  a  twelve 
inch  cut  may  be  imagined.  Then  we  bandaged 
him  securely,  gave  him  an  extra  drink  of 
canassa,  and  once  more  he  grinned  cheerfully. 
Later  he  and  his  antagonist  appeared  for  an- 
other drink,  each  affectionately  embracing  the 
other.  Without  the  slightest  difficulty  the 
wound  healed,  leaving  an  interesting  scalloped 
pattern  that  was  a  source  of  much  pride  to  its 
owner. 

But  It  was  obviously  necessary  to  get  out  to 
the  coast  for  machinery,  supplies  and  another 
gang  of  workers.  A  propria,  3.  messenger,  was 
sent  overland  up  the  river  to  notify  the  Lecco 


OPENING   UP   THE  JUNGLE      235 

rivermen  a  few  miles  above  and  a  week  later 
four  balsas  and  ten  Leccos  swung  around  the 
bend  under  the  bank  in  the  dawn  and  we 
started. 

The  crew  of  a  balsa  is  two  men,  one  fore  ana 
one  aft  of  the  platform  with  poles  or  a  jungle 
vine  for  a  drag  rope.  It  is  not  safe  for  more 
than  one  passenger  to  each  balsa  for  the  narrow 
raft  of  a  wood  almost  as  light  as  cork  is  lightly 
balanced  as  a  canoe.  There  is  no  freight 
worked  up  river,  except  rubber,  and  of  that  the 
big  bolachas  are  wedged  in  under  the  stilts  of 
the  platforms. 

Slowly  the  little  fleet  of  balsas  hugged  the 
shore,  poling  against  the  current.  Then  across 
the  river  appeared  a  stretch  of  narrow  beach 
and  the  poles  were  dropped  and  the  balsa  swung 
out  across  the  current  to  the  other  side.  Here 
the  vine  drag  rope  would  come  in  use  with  one 
Lecco  pulling  and  the  other  poling,  and  fairly 
rapid  progress  could  be  made.  There  was  a 
short  stop  at  a  tiny  Lecco  settlement  at  Inca- 
guarra  where  the  chief  Lecco,  the  cacique, 
lived.  He  was  a  shy,  bashful,  good  natured  old 
man  who  invited  us  into  his  hut  where  we  gave 
him  the  customary  drink. 


236  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

On  a  grass  matting  was  an  old  woman,  a  very 
old  woman,  his  mother,  the  cacique  explained. 
She  was  past  all  intelligence  and  in  the  last 
stages  of  senile  dissolution;  huddled  up  in  a 
corner,  she  murmured  and  clucked  to  herself, 
meanwhile  playing  aimlessly  with  an  empty  pot 
and  a  few  bits  of  grass.  The  dulled  eyes  gave 
no  signs  of  interest  or  understanding  when  the 
old  man  spoke  to  her;  she  suggested  more  an 
animal,  an  aimless,  warped  little  monkey  rather 
than  a  human  being. 

A  few  months  later  she  died  of  old  age  and 
the  old  cacique,  her  son,  came  with  her  body 
wrapped  in  a  frayed  matting  and  borrowed  a 
pick  to  dig  a  grave.  He  obviously  was  deeply 
grieved  in  the  subterranean  Indian  way,  and 
yet  there  was  not  the  slightest  vestige  of  cere- 
monial or  belief  connected  with  her  death.  She 
was  dead,  a  hole  in  the  ground  was  necessary, 
and  there  alone  and  by  himself  and  full  of  grief 
the  old  man  dug  it  in  the  remote  jungle  without 
any  more  curiosity  in  death  or  religious  expres- 
sion than  he  would  have  felt  in  digging  a  post- 
hole  for  a  new  hut. 

We  bought  a  few  platanos  and  yuccas  from 
this  place  and  made  our  breakfast  there.    Two 


OPENING    UP    THE   JUNGLE      237 

hours  after  leaving  a  freshet  from  the  rains  in 
the  mountains  ahead  suddenly  made  itself  felt 
and  we  were  forced  to  camp  till  it  went  down  a 
little.    We  did  not  move  until  the  next  morning. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

TWENTY-THREE  DAYS  AGAINST  THE  CURRENT 

THE  next  day  the  river  was  harder  and 
steeper  and  the  banks  offered  more  difB- 
culties  either  for  poling  or  dragging. 
From  one  side  to  the  other  we  shifted,  losing 
hundreds  of  yards  in  crossing  as  we  swept  down 
with  the  muddy  current.  And  yet  these  cross- 
ings were  never  made  until  the  last  moment 
when  the  poles  could  find  no  bottom  and  the 
steep  bank  came  down  like  a  cliff  into  from  fif- 
teen to  fifty  feet  of  water.  The  little  rapids 
that  were  nothing  more  than  riffles  coming 
down — that  is,  in  comparison  with  the  real 
canons  and  rapids — were  slowly  poled  and 
dragged  through  with  double  crews,  inch  by 
inch  around  some  jutting,  strategic  rocky  point 
and  into  the  upstream  eddy  beyond.  Boils  of 
water  burst  from  under  the  balsas  until  you  bal- 
anced with  the  Leccos  on  the  straining  raft  like 
rope  dancers  on  the  same  strand. 

238 


AGAINST   THE   CURRENT      239 

Once — and  no  one  would  suspect  a  clumsy 
looking  balsa  of  tippiness — an  extra  heavy  boil 
of  water  burst  under  the  balsa  ahead  and  shot 
Agamemnon  and  the  Leccos  into  the  water. 
Fortunately  it  was  at  the  edge  of  an  eddy  and  no 
serious  consequences  resulted  except  that  it  kept 
the  Leccos  diving  in  ten  feet  of  opaque,  muddy 
water,  for  half  an  hour  to  recover  a  rifle.  And 
it  took  a  half  a  day  to  get  the  rifle  in  shape 
again. 

That  night  we  reached  Caimalebra,  a  rubber 
pickers'  shack,  where  was  collected  the  rubber 
from  a  still  further  sub-divided  picket  line  of 
rubber  pickers,  and  here  we  camped,  exhausted. 
The  Ratama  was  just  ahead  and  this  could  only 
be  made  if  the  river  was  below  a  certain  stage. 
It  was  curious  to  watch  the  Leccos  read  every 
river  sign;  by  this  bush  and  that  boulder  they 
knew  the  height  of  water  in  any  rapid  above. 
Here  in  Caimalebra  they  announced  that  unless 
the  river  went  down  at  least  the  span  of 
a  man's  hand,  six  inches,  it  would  not  be 
possible  to  get  through  the  Ratama  canon 
and  rapids. 

That  afternoon  they  shook  their  head  against 
going  on,  the  six  inches  made  it  impossible.    By 


240  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

morning  it  would  be  lower  as  they  read  the 
weather  signs.  A  little  stick  was  stuck  in  near 
shore  to  measure.  In  the  dawn  the  river  had 
risen  six  feet  and  was  raging  past  the  camp, 
carrying  the  usual  collection  of  swirling  dead 
driftwood  and  newly  uprooted  trees.  Food 
was  running  low  for  we  had  taken  nothing 
from  the  main  camp,  as  they  would  need  it  all 
before  we  could  get  back.  The  Leccos  had  a 
little  rice  that  was  giving  outj  here  and  there  we 
could  get  platanos  from  a  rubber  hut  along  the 
river,  but  the  main  reliance  was  to  be  on  the 
country  between  these  points.  The  day  before 
a  wild  turkey,  shot  with  a  rifle  for  the  shot  cart- 
ridges swelled  so  that  a  shot  gun  was  useless, 
was  delicious  but  scanty.  This  day  I  took  a 
balsa  across  the  river  to  try  for  pig  or  parrot  or 
turkey,  or  monkey  if  we  were  lucky,  or  some- 
thing anyway,  for  the  Calmalebra  place  was 
vacant  of  platano  or  food  except  for  the  small 
family  there. 

All  day  I  tramped  over  the  hardest  kind  of 
country  with  four  of  the  Leccos,  swinging  down 
ledges  by  the  jungle  vines  or  wriggling  through 
the  masses  of  tangled  growth  in  the  trail  of  a 
Lecco  with  a  short  machete.     And  as  a  result — • 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      241 

nothing.  Once  there  was  a  parrot  motionless  in 
the  fork  of  a  tree  high  up  and  across  an  impass- 
able gully  and  not  worth  while. 

The  river  had  dropped  two  feet  and  risen 
three  later;  all  day  it  had  been  playing  at  this 
game  and  the  heavy  clouds  in  the  hills  made 
the  prospects  discouraging.  It  was  a  scanty 
meal  that  night.  After  darkness  had  settled  a 
tropical  downpour  came  up  that  showed  no 
signs  of  abating.  Steadily  it  poured  until  after 
daybreak  and  all  hands  slept  as  best  they  might, 
soaked  to  the  skin.  The  shelter  tent  was  in  a 
thin,  widespread  brook  that  the  upper  trenching 
did  not  stop  or  divert.  As  fast  as  one  built  a 
little  protecting  dam  it  was  washed  away  and 
the  bank  poured  a  steady  stream  into  the  river 
as  from  the  eaves  of  a  roof.  And  the  river  rose 
ten  feet  in  the  night.  It  seemed  impossible  that 
we  could  ever  get  around  the  Ratama,  but 
there  was  not  a  half  day's  rations  left  in 
camp. 

It  seemed  as  if  it  was  useless  to  wait  for  the 
river  and  essential  that  we  should  get  to  the  big 
barraca  of  Ysipuri  where  there  were  ample  sup- 
plies for  our  party.  There  was  no  overland 
trail,  it  was  through  a  jungle,  six,  ten,  fifteen 


242  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

miles,  you  could  take  your  choice  of  the  Lecco 
guesses.  So  with  a  couple  of  Leccos  we  started. 
The  others  were  to  try  the  canon  when  they 
would,  and  reliance  was  well  placed  in  them; 
there  are  no  finer  rivermen  to  be  found  any- 
where in  the  world. 

The  hunting  of  the  day  before  had  seemed 
hard  going,  but  it  was  nothing  to  this;  up  and 
down  over  gullies  and  waist  deep  in  the  tum- 
bling brooks  at  their  bottom;  down  sheer  cliffs 
where  the  tropical  vegetation  grew  so  rank  that 
a  natural  ladder  would  be  formed  by  the  tangle 
of  interlaced  roots  or  hanging  mora,  and  skirt- 
ing the  face  of  ravines  clawing  a  hand  and  foot- 
hold step  by  step.  I  carried  only  a  rifle  and 
twice  I  had  to  pass  it  to  a  Lecco  and  then  had 
no  easy  task  left.  As  for  the  two  Leccos,  they 
carried  somewhere  around  a  fifty  pound  pack 
each  and  barefooted  swung  along  among  the 
vegetation  as  easily  as  might  a  couple  of  mon- 
keys. 

Perhaps  the  river  went  down  suddenly, 
though  it  is  more  likely  that  it  was  the  removal 
of  the  diffidence  that  our  presence  entailed;  at 
any  rate,  the  Leccos  themselves  pulled  through 
that  night  and  reached  Ysipuri  with  the  balsas. 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      243 

For  thirteen  days  we  were  held  in  Ysipuri,  the 
river  persistently  refusing  to  lessen  its  height, 
while  a  succession  of  rains  sent  down  a  series  of 
heavy  freshets.     It  was  not  a  dull  time. 

A  Lecco  was  held  as  a  prisoner  by  the  agent 
on  a  charge  of  attempted  murder.  I  saw  him  as 
in  the  dusk  of  evening  he  sat  in  the  doorway  of 
his  prison  hut  taking  the  air.  His  wife  and 
small  boy  sat  with  him  and  kept  his  legs  muffled 
in  an  old  poncho  so  that  the  heavy  iron  shackles 
riveted  upon  his  ankles  would  not  show.  He 
was  a  fine  looking  Lecco  and  obviously  of  enor- 
mous strength.  It  seems  that  another  Lecco  was 
found  with  his  back  cut  to  ribbons,  apparently 
from  one  of  the  twisted  bull  whips  of  that  coun- 
try, and  with  his  breast  beaten  in. 

The  victim  lived  and  this  Lecco  had  disap- 
peared. Presently  he  was  captured  and  held  in 
leg  shackles,  waiting  for  some  indefinite  ar- 
raignment. However,  while  we  were  at  the 
barraca  he  escaped,  leg  shackles  and  all,  and  was 
not  heard  of  until,  some  months  later,  he  turned 
up  below  at  our  camp  and  we  became  good 
friends.  There  was  the  gravest  doubt  as  to  his 
guilt,  the  Leccos  are  most  peaceful,  and  the 
whole  affair  was  the  result  of  a  drunken  fiesta  of 


244  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

mixed  breeds  in  which  not  one  was  fit  to  remem- 
ber anything. 

In  addition  there  was  a  serious  fight  among 
the  Cholos,  Leccos,  and  rubber  pickers  one  Sun- 
day evening  in  which  shots  were  fired,  a  dog 
killed,  and  a  couple  of  men  wounded  slightly, 
while  numerous  others  nursed  unseen  sore  heads 
and  bruises.  An  appeal  for  help  was  sent  over 
the  little  creek  that  ran  through  the  barraca  and 
the  agent  called  on  us ;  so  our  little  party  of  three 
white  men,  a  half  dozen  of  the  more  reliable  em- 
ployees, and  the  messenger  splashed  back 
through  the  darkness  with  our  guns  in  our  hands 
— in  addition  my  heart  was  in  my  mouth — and 
reestablished  order.  It  was  a  drunken  fight 
over  the  favors  of  an  old  Lecco  lady,  a  bleared 
old  party  of  some  fifty  coquetting  years. 

In  one  day  in  the  main  shack  two  snakes  were 
killed,  one  in  a  room  and  the  other  in  the  kitchen, 
both  of  the  deadly  German-flag  species.  Beau- 
tiful, slender  reptiles  they  were,  with  broad 
bands  of  black  broken  at  regular  intervals  with 
narrow  bands  of  cream  and  vermilion  stripes, 
and  of  exceeding  venom.  That  same  night  as  I 
threw  open  my  blanket  preparatory  to  turning 
in  a  third  German-flag  made  a  graceful  letter 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      245 

S  on  the  blue  wool.  Alarmed  he  darted  off 
through  the  cane  walls  into  the  next  room,  the 
store-room.  Two  successive  rooms  were  emp- 
tied before  the  snake  was  at  last  killed.  There 
was  not  a  man  in  the  place  who  would  have  gone 
to  sleep  with  that  snake  in  the  place,  if  it  took 
all  night  to  get  him. 

Then,  just  as  we  were  about  to  start,  a  young 
boy  was  brought  in,  half  Lecco  and  half  Cholo, 
the  son  of  a  man  who  had  been  murdered  while 
working  in  his  little  yucca  patch  up  across  the 
Uyappi  River.  He  had  been  shot  from  behind 
through  the  stomach  and  had  lain  helpless  until 
he  died,  although  this  boy,  from  his  own  account, 
was  in  the  hut  less  than  a  hundred  feet  away  all 
the  time.  The  boy,  he  was  not  twelve,  stuck  to 
his  story  that  he  had  heard  no  shot,  nothing  out 
of  the  ordinary.  The  chief  agent  in  the  barraca 
consulted  with  the  Lecco  crews  who  had  brought 
him  in. 

"He  did  it,"  they  responded;  "make  him 
tell." 

He  was  flogged  with  a  knotted  rope's  end  and 
though  he  still  clung  to  his  palpably  false  story 
— and  also  he  had  been  heard  to  make  threats 
against  the  old  man.    After  the  flogging  Re  was 


246  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

locked  up  to  face  another  later  unless  he  should 
have  repented. 

Up  here  in  nicely  civilized  and  sensitive  sur- 
roundings the  flogging  reads  like  the  brutality  of 
a  savage  tribe.  It  was  revolting  and  yet — what 
would  you  have  done?  The  intendente  would 
have  had  him  flogged  with  a  twisted  bull  whip — 
do  you  know  what  that  is  or  what  that  means  ?  A 
twisted  thong  of  rawhide  whose  blow,  drawn 
skillfully  in  the  delivering,  cuts  a  strip  from  the 
flesh;  where  fifty  lashes  properly  laid  on  are 
equivalent  to  death.  And  to  have  turned  him 
over  to  the  legal  authorities — the  legal  authori- 
ties east  of  the  Andes!  They  are  there  in  name 
— but  their  functions  are  a  joke.  The  best  the 
boy  could  have  hoped  for  would  have  been  to 
march  wearily  day  after  day  in  leg  shackles  and 
chained  to  his  guards  or  to  any  other  adult 
prisoner,  over  the  snows  and  blizzards  of  the 
high  passes  and  then  to  rot  dully  in  a  Bolivian 
jail.  Probably  he  could  not  have  undergone 
the  rigors  of  the  march,  and  lucky  for  him  if  he 
could  not. 

As  it  was,  he  had  the  benefit  of  a  civilized 
doubt  and  received  only  what  the  sentiment  of 
his  own  people  demanded.    And  he  was  not  too 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      247 

old  but  what  he  could  profit  by  it.  By  strict 
adherence  to  legalized  forms,  or  those  of  them 
that  would  have  been  applied,  he  would  have 
been  killed  by  slow,  indifferent  inches. 

At  last  the  river  went  down  enough  and  we 
were  off.  We  poled  steadily  along  through  an 
unending  series  of  rapids,  crossing  from  one  side 
to  the  other  through  canons  and  losing  in  the 
crossing  all  and  more  of  the  hard  won  ground. 
In  one  place  in  three  hours  we  did  not  gain 
one  hundred  yards.  And  then  came  the  rains 
again. 

We  barely  made  the  farther  side  of  the  Uy- 
appi  when  the  river  laid  siege.  It  rose  twelve 
feet  in  the  night  and  held  us  three  days  in  a  little 
hut  at  the  junction  of  the  two  rivers,  raining  for 
two  of  them.  The  agent  at  Ysipuri  had  joined 
with  us  as  he  too  was  going  out  on  business, 
and  his  balseros  combined  with  ours  made  a 
very  respectable  expedition.  The  tiny  hut  was 
built  by  one  man  for  himself  and  into  it  each 
night  crowded  some  twenty  Indians.  They  held 
a  dance,  a  queer,  shuffling  trot  with  dull,  droning 
mumbles  that  passed  among  the  Leccos  as  song, 
one  night  and  the  next  day  they  spent  in  celebrat- 
ing the  birthday  of  one  of  the  crew.    Cane  plat- 


248  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

forms  were  built  in  the  hut  until  there  were  three 
floors,  or  tiers,  to  the  eaves  and  on  these  we  all 
crowded  sociably. 

Their  shy  diffidence  gave  way,  they  laughed 
and  joked  openly  and  with  a  childish  innocence 
over  any  man  being  able  to  see  out  of  glasses. 
They  asked  me  questions  of  my  home,  my  tribe, 
and  my  rivers,  but  the  answers  were  Greek  to 
them.  They  had  no  means  of  knowing  the  out- 
side world.  They  answered  my  questions  cheer- 
fully, through  an  interpreter  each  way,  of  course. 
They  taught  me  to  count  in  the  Lecco  tongue, 
the  Riki-riki  as  they  call  their  dialect: 

One — Bera 
.  Two — Toi 
Three — Tsai 
Four — Dirai 
Five — Bercha 
Six — Ber-pachmo 

Seven — Toi-pachmo  ' 

Eight — Tsai-pachmo 
Nine — Ber-pela 
Ten — Ber-beuncay 
Eleven — Beri-beuncay-ber-hotai 
Twelve — Beri-beuncay-toi-hotai,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      249 

Twenty  is  simply  Toi-bencai  and  beyond  this 
few  Leccos  could  go  with  certainty,  while  some 
were  at  sea  even  up  to  this  point.  Yet  they  had 
no  difficulty  in  actual  counting;  it  was  simply 
over  names  for  the  higher  numbers  that  they 
stumbled. 

Once  more  we  began  the  poling  and  dragging. 
This  stretch  of  the  river  had  given  us  no  con- 
cern coming  down,  yet  it  was  one  of  the  hardest 
we  encountered  on  the  long  pull  up.  One  rock 
that  jutted  from  the  shore  took  my  balsa  an  hour 
and  a  half  to  pass.  Time  and  time  again  the 
vine  parted  and  my  Lecco  and  I  were  swept 
down  with  the  current  and  around  in  the  eddies, 
to  repeat  the  process  after  we  had  paddled  ashore 
and  tried  again. 

In  another  place  we  had  to  work  the  balsa  up 
into  the  very  spray  from  a  cataract  only  four  feet 
high,  but  over  which  the  river  poured  in  a  thun- 
derous volume,  then  cast  loose  with  one  mighty 
shove,  and  paddle  for  the  opposite  bank,  while  in 
the  meantime  the  balsa  was  being  tossed  in  the 
bursting  boils  of  water  at  the  surface  or  spun 
and  dragged  like  a  chip  by  the  whirlpools  that 
floated  with  the  current.  Three  times  this  swept 
my  balsa  half  a  mile  below — only  one  balsa  made 


250  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

the  crossing  at  the  first  try — and  it  looked  more 
than  once  as  though  we  would  be  upset  for  an  un- 
certain swim. 

That  night  we  made  camp  at  Tiaponti.  Here 
a  new  cane  shack  had  just  had  the  triumphant 
finish  to  a  palm  thatch  roof  and  everyone  in  that 
little  finca  was  already  drunk.  From  some- 
where we  got  one  precious  chicken  for  ourselves 
and  the  Lecco  crews  laid  down  to  sleep,  scarcely 
bothering  the  cook;  they  were  so  exhausted.  It 
was  the  only  time  I  ever  saw  any  of  them 
decline  the  opportunity  for  one  of  these  festal 
drunks. 

Early  the  next  morning  we  started.  One  more 
day  that  was  a  little  easier  and  for  hours  we  poled 
upstream  against  a  gentle  current  along  the  bank 
and  picked  wild  guayavas  from  the  overhanging 
trees.  It  is  a  delicious  fruit — although  never 
since  have  I  been  able  to  find  its  kind,  even  in  the 
cultivated  tropics.  This  wild  guayava  looked 
somewhat  like  a  small,  gnarled  quince  on  the 
outside;  on  the  inside  it  had  a  most  delicate  pink 
pulp  beyond  a  little  rind,  a  delicious  pulp  that 
combined  the  melting  flavor  of  the  strawberry 
with  the  texture  and  modifications  of  a  superior 
watermelon.     It  was  good. 


AGAINST   THE    CURRENT      251 

That  night  we  landed  in  Guanai, — twenty- 
three  days  of  baffled  progress  against  the  same 
river  and  the  same  current  that  had  flicked  us 
down  from  this  same  Guanai  in  two  days. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

BY  PACK  MULE  THROUGH  THE  JUNGLE 

IT  was  useless  to  attempt  to  battle  with  the 
river  further.  Above,  before  Mapiri  could 
be  reached,  were  narrower  canons  where 
there  were  only  handholds  and  often  not  that, 
where  the  canons  were  often  nothing  more  than 
a  polished  flume  of  rock.  It  had  taken  the  Lec- 
cos  two  failures  and  over  a  month  of  the  most 
gruelling  work  when  they  finally  reached  us 
before  in  that  village,  and  then  they  had  been 
living  on  berries  and  roots  and  palm-nuts  for 
the  last  two  days.  So  we  decided  on  the  over- 
land trail  to  Mapiri.  There  we  could  get 
our  saddles  and  outfit  for  the  trail  over  the  high 
passes. 

Up  to  Guanai  there  was  no  trail,  not  even  a 
Lecco  foot-path,  and  it  was  a  relief  to  give  the 
orders  for  mules  and  see  the  sure-footed,  flop- 

252 


THROUGH   THE   JUNGLE       253 

eared  brutes  come  ambling  to  our  doorway. 
For  a  saddle  there  was  a  wreck,  a  dried  leather 
cast-off  that  would  go  after  some  piecing  with 
rope.  An  arriero,  dressed  in  a  suit  made  from 
old  flour  sacks  with  the  brand  still  showing  in 
faded  blue,  had  a  pack  train  that  was  just  going 
out  with  some  rubber  and  it  was  his  cargo  mules 
that  we  hired.  His  ordinary  route  lay  through 
the  Tipuani  country  and  he  charged  us  some  out- 
rageous sum — something  like  five  dollars  apiece, 
silver — for  going  out  via  Mapiri  over  the  worst 
trail  in  Bolivia  and  some  sixty  or  eighty  miles 
out  of  his  way. 

Officially,  both  Mapiri  and  Guanai  recognize 
that  they  are  connected  by  a  land  trail  yet  we 
had  not  left  Guanai  a  half  hour  before  the  last 
vestige  of  a  trail  was  gone  and  the  mules  plunged 
into  a  wilderness  of  low  scrub  and  tall  ferns. 
The  Andean  foothills  twisted  themselves  in  a 
maze  of  huge  convolutions  through  and  up  and 
down  whose  great  gullies  and  jungled  ravines 
we  slipped  and  scrambled.  By  intuition  or  ob- 
scure landmarks  the  Cholo  arriero  found  his 
way  and  presently  we  zigzagged  down  a  slope 
where  once  more  appeared  the  overgrown  re- 
mains of  a  trail.     Then  that  too  disappeared  and 


254  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

we  followed  up  the  bed  of  a  mountain  brook, 
struck  off  to  one  side,  again  plunged  into  the 
brook,  climbed  a  hill,  struck  another  foaming 
torrent  and  skirted  its  banks  or  followed  its 
windings — the  ravine  through  which  it  flowed 
being  impassable  in  any  other  way — and  at  last 
struck  a  tiny,  grass  grown,  level  glade.  It  was 
not  late,  yet  overhead  the  tops  of  the  trees  were 
matted  in  jungle  growths  until  but  scant  light 
filtered  through,  there  was  the  cool  dampness  of 
evening  and  the  perpetual  sound  of  the  creaking 
chirping  bugs  that,  in  the  open  world,  only  tune 
up  for  night  concerts. 

The  rains  had  left  the  jungle  dripping  with 
water;  we  ourselves  were  as  wet  as  though  we 
had  been  out  in  a  storm,  and  even  the  blankets 
from  the  tent  pack  were  clammy  and  damp.  By 
morning  they  were  wringing  wet  and  all  hands 
were  soaked  to  the  skin.  A  night  storm  and  a 
hasty  camp  were  responsible,  although  how  a 
camp  could  be  made  on  a  spongy  soil  up  against 
a  mountain  that  shed  its  waters  like  a  roof  on 
your  camping  bed,  and  for  one  night  in  a  march, 
is  a  matter  of  engineering  and  not  of  travel. 

In  the  morning  all  the  wood  was  too  wet  to 
burn  and  a  cold  breakfast  of  leftover  tea  from 


I 


THROUGH   THE  JUNGLE      255 

the  night  before,  some  soggy  galletas,  crackers, 
and  chancaca  added  no  zest  to  the  opening  day. 
Like  the  day  before  this  was  spent  in  climbing 
through  the  jungle-matted  hills  or  taking  ad- 
vantage of  occasional  brooks.  Here  and  there 
the  trail  reappeared,  generally  in  a  series  of  steps 
cut  in  a  slippery  clay  hill,  steps  three  and  four 
feet  high  and  with  their  tread  banked  by  a  log 
to  keep  it  from  washing  away.  It  was  killing 
work  for  the  mules  and  generally  we  dismounted 
and  climbed  alongside.  They  would  go  up  in  a 
series  of  goat-like  jumps,  throwing  the  watery 
mud  in  a  shower  with  every  plunge.  Walking 
up  such  places  was  safer  for  they  were  really  of 
about  the  pitch  of  a  ladder  and  a  single  slip  on 
the  wet,  greasy  clay  would  have  sent  both  mule 
and  rider  in  a  broken  mass  to  the  bottom  of  the 
gully. 

Early  in  the  afternoon — it  was  not  two  o'clock 
— we  were  blocked  by  the  Mariapa  River ;  it  was 
a  creek,  broad  and  shallow  and  turbulent  and 
swollen  with  the  recent  rains.  The  only  ford 
was  impassable,  so  once  more  we  sat  down  to 
wait  for  a  river  to  go  down.  It  rose  instead  and 
that  night  we  camped  by  the  ford,  wet  from  the 
afternoon  rain  and  caked  with  mud. 


256  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

There  was  no  wood  dry  enough  to  burn  and 
a  cold  supper  with  a  tin  of  Chicago's  most  fa- 
mous clammy  beef  stew — "  roast  beef  " — pur- 
chased in  Guanai  set  forth  the  camp  banquet  log. 
It  was  already  dusk  above  the  tree  tops  when  we 
made  camp  and  darkness  below  so  that  the  Cholo 
arriero  had  not  noticed  where  we  hung  the  shel- 
ter tent  from  the  bushes  and  lay  down  together. 
In  the  morning  we  awoke  covered  with  a  multi- 
tude of  scurrying,  inquisitive  ants  of  some  large 
red  species.  They  did  not  bite  and  were  inof- 
fensive so  far  as  that  was  concerned,  but  our 
belts,  our  holsters,  our  shoes,  our  gauntlets,  every- 
thing of  leather,  looked  as  though  it  had  broken 
out  with  small-pox.  Tiny  disks,  perfectly 
round,  had  been  cut  out  of  the  surface  of  the 
leather;  and  in  some  apparently  choice  spots 
where  the  surface  leather  had  become  exhausted 
they  had  started  cutting  out  disks  in  deeper 
layers.  One  gauntlet  was  worthless  and  the  up- 
per of  one  shoe  was  on  the  verge  of  dissolution. 

By  morning  the  river  had  gone  down  enough 
to  make  it  possible  to  attempt  it.  The  cargo 
mules  were  packed  with  their  packs  high  on 
their  backs  and  driven  in.  As  the  pack  mules 
took  to  the  water,  our  riding  mules — who  had 


THROUGH    THE   JUNGLE       257 

always  carried  cargo  with  the  others — came 
scrambling  down  the  bank  and  before  they  could 
be  stopped  were  out  in  the  ford.  Thereupon  we 
undressed,  cut  long  stout  poles,  hung  our  clothes 
about  our  necks,  and  started  for  the  farther  bank. 

The  water  was  from  the  mountains,  cold  and 
icy,  and  the  river  bottom  was  rough  with  boul- 
ders. With  the  pole  we  groped  along  after  the 
cautious  fashion  of  a  tripod  while  the  cold  cur- 
rent rose  and  chilled  rib  and  marrow  and  made 
the  matter  of  balance  one  of  delicacy.  There 
was  no  danger  of  drowning,  but  to  be  swept  ofif 
one's  feet  meant  broken  bones  among  the  white 
waters  below.  Not  until  it  was  too  late  to  re- 
treat did  these  phases  loom  up  clearly.  Often 
one  stood  poised  and  balanced  by  the  pole  with 
its  hold  down  stream  while  the  current  boiled 
around  the  up  stream  armpit,  not  daring  to  grope 
for  the  next  step  lest  the  pressure  of  water  would 
carry  one  ofif.  It  was  different  with  that  tough 
old  arriero;  he  cut  himself  a  pole,  hung  his 
clothes  around  his  neck  and  came  briskly  across 
the  water  through  which  I  had  been  teetering 
uncertainly  for  twenty  minutes. 

Another  camp,  high  and,  for  a  wonder,  in  the 
open  from  which  we  could  see  the  rolling  An- 


258  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

dean  foot-hills  stretching  like  a  billowing  sea  to 
the  horizon.  Three  months  of  steady  traveling 
would  not  bring  one  to  those  farther  hills  that 
were  within  vision. 

The  smoke  of  a  rubber  picker's  hut  drifted  up 
from  a  little  gully  below  us  and  the  arriero  came 
back  with  a  chicken,  a  bunch  of  platanos  and 
some  onions.  The  grub  box  was  empty  and  for 
that  day  we  had  been  going  on  a  handful  of  rice 
for  breakfast,  and  parched  corn  and  Indian 
cigarettes.  Not  a  sign  of  game  had  been  en- 
countered since  leaving  Guanai,  not  even  a  bird 
big  enough  to  eat.  The  mules  were  thin  and 
gaunt,  for  them  there  had  been  only  what  they 
could  forage  in  the  jungle  or  here  and  there 
along  the  trail. 

From  here  on  there  was  a  fairly  defined  trail. 
There  was  also  a  continuation  of  small  rivers  and 
half  the  time  we  seemed  to  be  fording.  An  oc- 
casional rubber  picker's  hut  was  in  plain  view 
and  the  late  morning  smoke  from  their  curing 
fires  rose  from  many  points  in  the  forest.  A 
sugar-cane  finca  with  its  distillery  alongside  for 
canassa  spread  beyond  a  broad,  muddy  river. 
The  mules  forded  this  river,  as  did  the  arriero, 
but  there  was  a  bridge  there,  a  rough  tower  and 


On  the  Rope  a  Trolley  Worked  Back  and  Forth  frcm  which 
was  Suspended  a  Tiny  Platform 


THROUGH  THE  JUNGLE      259 

platform  on  either  side  of  the  river  and  a  rope 
stretched  across.  On  the  rope  a  trolley  worked 
back  and  forth  from  which  was  suspended  a  tiny 
platform  for  the  passenger  to  straddle.  On  the 
farther  platform  an  Indian  ground  the  windlass 
that  produced  the  ferriage.  It  cost  four  cents, 
gold,  to  be  hauled  across  high  in  the  air,  over 
this  affair. 

The  old  Indian  at  the  distillery  sold  us  some 
real  bananas,  some  platanos,  and  three  eggs. 
This  latter  is  one  of  the  rarest  of  articles  in  any 
Indian  or  Cholo's  shack,  for  always  there  is  a  pet 
monkey  and  the  monkey  is  more  fond  of  eggs — 
quite  as  much  for  the  delicious  thrill  of  break- 
age as  for  their  flavor — than  the  Indian;  also  he 
is  far  more  adept  at  finding  them  and  it  is  a  very 
vigilant  hen  indeed  that  can  guard  her  full  origi- 
nal setting  of  eggs  once  the  monkey's  agile  sus- 
picions are  aroused.  One  more  camp  in  the 
hacienda  of  Villa  Vista,  a  place  very  similar 
to  the  hacienda  of  old  Violand,  where  at  last 
we  had  real  beds,  or  those  saw-buck  cots  of  na- 
tive make.  I  recalled  how  clumsy  these  same 
cots  had  looked  as  we  had  come  into  the  mon- 
tana  and  left  civilization  behind  us.  Now  they 
seemed  to  our  sophisticated  eyes  like  the  most  al- 


26o  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

luringly  aesthetic  devices  for  inducing  and  en- 
couraging sleep  that  were  ever  invented. 

From  the  comforts  of  Villa  Vista  it  was  but 
one  day  into  Mapiri,  and  here  we  got  out  our 
own  saddles,  rubbed  the  mould  ofif,  saw  that 
bread  enough  was  baked  to  last  us  out  to  Sorata, 
and  started.  It  had  been  exactly  one  month 
since  we  stepped  on  board  the  balsas  at  the  camp 
down  the  river.  And  that  same  distance  from 
Mapiri  to  the  camp  had  been  made  on  rafts  on 
our  voyage  with  the  current  and  shooting  the 
rapids  and  canons,  in  three  days — a  day's  travel 
down  the  river  being  equal  to  ten  days'  slow 
work  against  the  same  current. 

Again  the  slow,  killing  climb  over  the  high 
pass;  the  toll  gate  with  its  queer  little  Indian 
child,  the  drizzly  promontory  of  Tolopampa, 
Yngenio,  and  then  the  final  blizzards  and  snows 
at  the  summit  of  the  pass.  From  this  summit  it 
is  less  than  a  half  day's  ride  into  Sorata,  a  trail 
that  takes  the  best  part  of  two  days'  climbing  to 
make  the  other  way. 

At  Sorata  we  changed  mules  and  tooK  the 
regular  trail,  not  this  time  that  rarely  used,  but 
shorter  back  trail  where  the  sullen,  hostile  Ay- 
maras  have  their  homes,  and  on  the  third  day 


THROUGH    THE  JUNGLE       261 

were  once  more  above  the  valley  of  La  Paz.  We 
looked  down  on  its  warm  red  roofs  and  the  little 
green  patch  of  its  park  with  the  masses  of  low 
dobe  houses  through  which  there  ran  the  feeling 
of  rectangular  streets  with  pavements  and  the 
lazily  drifting  throngs  with  actual  stiff,  starched 
collars  and  shoes  with  soles  and  laces  instead 
of  the  patch  of  leather  with  a  pucker  string 
around  the  top,  and  thick  crockery  plates  instead 
of  enamelled  tin,  and  pastry  and  roasts,  and  twice 
a  week  a  real  band  in  the  plaza — all  the  effete  ac- 
complishments of  civilization.  It  is  no  wonder 
the  Bolivians  solemnly  assure  you  that  La  Paz  is 
the  Little  Paris  of  South  America.  When  you 
approach  it  from  the  eastern  slopes  of  the  Andes, 
it  is  a  little  Paris,  a  little  London,  a  little  old 
New  York. 

Two  weeks  later  I  was  on  my  way  back  into 
the  montana  while  the  chief  engineer  was  on  his 
way  to  Iquiqui  or  Callao  after  machinery.  .  A 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Jackson  had  their  headquarters  in 
Sorata  where  the  former  represented  a  rubber 
company  and  they,  together  with  Drew,  a  wiry 
little  Englishman,  who  had  packed  into  the 
country  with  nothing  but  a  blanket  and  the 
ragged  clothes  he  walked  in,  and  myself,  com- 


262  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

bined  to  charter  a  tiny  stage-coach,  the  *'  mos- 
quito '^  as  it  was  known.  This,  with  six  horses  to 
haul  it  to  the  top  of  the  alto  and  then  with  horses 
in  relays  at  each  tambo  would  bring  us  to  Achi- 
cachi  on  the  southern  shores  of  Lake  Titicaca  in 
one  single  day  of  from  before  dawn  till  sunset. 
From  there  it  would  be  muleback  over  the  first 
pass  and  down  the  trails  into  Sorata. 

The  mosquito  was  just  big  enough  for  four 
and  a  tight  fit  at  that.  This  was  fortunate  for 
the  little  coach — from  the  outside  it  looked  more 
like  a  packing  case —  with  slits  of  side  windows 
slung  above  a  pair  of  axles  on  top  of  which 
perched  two  barefooted  Aymaras,  one  to  drive 
and  the  other,  a  boy,  to  sling  the  long  thonged 
whip  pitched  and  tumbled  in  the  steady  gallop 
over  the  rough  trails  of  the  plain  like  a  motor 
boat  in  a  choppy  seaway. 

At  the  mud  walled  tambo  of  Cocuta  the  first 
change  of  horses  was  made.  Before  we  reached 
Machicomaca,  the  next  tambo  for  new  horses 
where  we  ate  breakfast  in  a  mud  walled,  win- 
dowless  room,  the  brake  broke  or  fell  off  and 
had  been  lost  somewhere  on  the  rough  trail. 
The  steady  gallop  of  the  tough,  rough  mountain 
horses  kept  time  to  the  steady  singing  and  punc- 


THROUGH   THE  JUNGLE       263 

tuating  crack  of  the  whip.  And  yet  rarely  was 
a  horse  struck.  An  Aymara  will  drive  a  crip- 
pled animal  or  leave  it  to  die  of  starvation  on  a 
lonely  trail  without  a  thought,  but  it  is  rarely 
that  he  will  abuse  a  beast  with  actual  violence. 

After  the  change  of  horses  at  Copencara  there 
came  a  steep  descent  something  under  a  mile 
long.  The  driver  stopped  just  over  the  crest 
and  pointed  to  the  broken  brake.  Drew  spoke 
a  little  Aymara,  but  the  sight  of  the  broken  brake 
and  the  steep  hill  was  enough.  We  began  un- 
tangling ourselves  to  descend.  Drew  climbed 
out  stiffly  and  was  followed  by  Jackson,  this 
freed  his  wife,  but  she  had  scarcely  put  her  foot 
to  the  step  when  the  mosquito  gave  a  lurch  for- 
ward and  we  were  off.  There  had  not  been  even 
time  to  jump.  It  happened  in  an  instant;  the 
door  was  banging  with  the  plunging  coach ;  Mrs. 
Jackson  was  thrown  in  one  corner  and  above  the 
noise  of  flying  stones  and  rattling  of  the  coach 
could  be  heard  the  Aymara  yelling  at  his  horses 
and  the  crack  of  the  whip. 

Unused  to  breechings,  these  mountain  horses, 
half  wild — at  least  as  far  as  harness  was 
concerned — had  felt  the  mosquito  press  forward 
against  them.    They  were  off  in  a  flash  and 


264  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

jumping  down  this  hill  with  an  unbraked  coach 
bouncing  at  their  heels.  If  the  horses  could  not 
outrun  the  coach  we  stood  a  certain  chance  of 
piling  up  in  a  wreck,  horses,  Aymara,  coach, 
and  two  perfectly  good  and  useful  Americans. 
So  it  was  that  the  Aymara  held  his  horses  at 
their  top  speed. 

Never  was  there  such  a  ride — not  even  in  the 
rapids  of  the  Ratama.  In  one  instant  of  lurch- 
ing we  looked  fairly  down  upon  the  swift, 
blurred  ground  over  which  we  sped,  and  in  the 
next  there  flashed  past  the  rim  of  snow-capped 
mountains  and  then  the  cold,  deep  blue  of  the 
high  heavens.  The  flying  stones  from  the  horses 
banged  against  the  mosquito  in  a  vicious  storm. 
Inside  my  voice  could  not  be  heard  above  the 
uproar.  I  had  somehow  wadded  all  the  pon- 
chos and  blankets  and  wedged  Mrs.  Jackson  in 
one  corner  of  the  mosquito  in  very  much  the 
same  way  as  one  packs  china;  if  we  smashed  the 
wadding  might  help  a  little.  Then  I  braced 
myself  with  my  feet  against  a  corner  of  the  roof 
with  all  the  purchase  I  could  secure  and  pushed 
against  the  bundle  I  had  made.  It  was  the  only 
thing  I  could  think  of,  and  at  any  rate,  it  held 
us  both  firm  against  the  terrific  bouncing. 


Never  Was  There  Such  a  Ride — Not  Even  in  the   Rapids  of  the 

Ratama 


THROUGH   THE  JUNGLE       265 

Presently, — though  it  seemed  an  hour — we 
could  feel  that  the  bottom  of  the  hill  was  reached 
and  then  came  the  slow  lessening  of  speed  as  the 
Aymara  brought  the  horses  gradually  to  a  stop. 
We  climbed  out,  the  Aymara  got  down  off  his 
perch  and  looked  over  the  horses  curiously,  and 
waved  his  hands  in  expressive  pantomime  at  the 
mosquito  and  back  at  the  hill,  a  steep  water-worn 
trail  of  ruts  on  either  side  of  which  the  ground 
dropped  in  rough  slopes.  Luckily  it  was 
straight,  the  lightest  curve,  at  the  pace  we  had 
gone,  would  have  shot  the  outfit  halfway  across 
the  gorges  before  we  struck  the  ground.  One 
horse  was  lame  and  the  others  sagged  until  we 
made  the  last  change  at  Guarina,  another  old 
time  Aymara  village. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

THE  INDIAN  UPRISING 

IT  was  in  the  cold  dusk  of  the  high  altitude 
and  tingling  with  the  chill  winds  that  blew 
from  Mount  Sorata  when  we  clattered 
through  the  streets  of  Achicachi.  Little  crystals 
of  ice  were  already  forming  in  the  stagnant  pools 
and  little  flurries  of  snow  stung  as  it  whistled 
through  the  dull  streets  of  this  ancient  town.  On 
the  edge  of  Lake  Titicaca,  this  ancient  town  of 
Achicachi  is  the  home  of  petty  smugglers  who 
can  run  their  contraband  in  the  native  straw 
boats  across  from  the  Peruvian  shores.  The  re- 
mains of  the  old  mud  wall  that  surrounded  it  in 
the  days  of  the  Incas  are  still  fairly  preserved 
in  places  and  its  population  is  still  practically 
Aymara,  with  only  a  sprinkling  of  half-breed 
Cholos. 
On  fiesta  days  the  little  police  are  held  in  their 

barracks  on  the  big  open  plaza  and  sally  forth 

266 


THE  INDIAN   UPRISING        267 

only  in  parties.  The  Aymaras  gather  in  great 
numbers  from  a  score  of  tribal  divisions  and 
unite  in  the  typical  drunken  dances  and  festivi- 
ties. Factions  forget  and  renew  old  differences 
and  toward  evening  little  battles  break  out  in  the 
streets  or  the  plaza.  The  streets  are  unsafe  and 
the  few  white  Bolivians  and  better  Cholos  stay 
within.  Always  there  is  the  danger  of  an  In- 
dian uprising  and  that  occasionally  takes  form. 
Between  times  in  the  fiestas  the  Aymaras  are 
handled  without  regard,  at  the  first  word — or 
less — they  are  clubbed  and  for  but  little  more 
shot. 

The  dusk  of  fiesta  is  filled  with  drunken,  sul- 
len Indians  among  whom  wander  here  and  there 
dishevelled  creatures  with  clotted  wounds.  Oc- 
casionally the  sullen  buzz  rises,  a  little  restless 
movement  begins  from  some  section  of  the  big 
plaza,  and  in  a  moment  a  knot  of  Bolivian  police 
are  plunging  in  to  come  back  with  bloody  car- 
bine butts.  Always  there  is  the  dull  hatred  of 
the  Bolivian  by  the  Aymara  which  comes  easily 
to  the  surface  at  these  times.  And  there  is  not 
a  Bolivian  statute  governing  the  sale  of  liquor 
to  an  Aymara;  if  he  gets  dangerous  when  drunk, 
beat  him;  if  too  dangerous,  kill  him. 


268  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

In  the  "  hotel "  in  Achicachi  the  rooms  are 
windowless  and  range  around  the  four  sides  of 
the  patio.  You  furnish  your  own  bed  and  bed- 
ding and  each  holds  a  heavy  log  with  which 
to  bar  the  door.  In  the  patio  and  in  and  out  of 
the  open  rooms  some  native  razor-back  hogs 
wandered  at  their  will  and  off  on  one  side,  more 
exclusive,  was  a  friendly  peccary  who  would 
sidle  up  and  grunt  sociably  in  return  for  a  little 
back  scratching.  Over  by  one  of  the  rooms  and 
tied  outside  was  the  queerest  animal ;  from  across 
the  patio  it  looked  like  a  very  small  bear  with 
heavy,  long  fur  yet  with  queer  indefinable  dif- 
ference that  explained  itself  when  a  closer  ap- 
proach developed  a  monkey!  He  was  a  capu- 
cin,  the  most  friendly  and  delightful  of  the  mon- 
key tribe,  and  here  he  was,  miles  from  his  warm, 
tropical  home,  cheerfully  chattering  by  the  side 
of  a  tin  can  that  was  already  filmed  with  ice  and 
sticking  out  his  pink  tongue  to  lick  off  the  flakes 
of  snow  that  gathered  on  his  fur — a  fur  that  had 
grown  to  enormous  length  and  thickness  and  left 
him  peering  with  a  brown,  quizzical  face  out 
from  it  like  a  shrivelled  winter-clad  chauffeur 
of  some  stock  broker's  quean. 

The  next  evening  we  arrived  in  Sorata — and 


THE  INDIAN   UPRISING        269 

from  there  on  the  difficulties  began  to  pile  them- 
selves, one  on  the  other.  A  big,  abrupt  and 
surly  egotist  had  been  carefully  chosen  by  some 
Board  of  Directors  back  in  the  States  to  manage 
a  rubber  proposition — in  a  frontier  country  like 
that  every  one  depends  for  countless  things  on 
neighbors,  though  neighbors  may  mean  separa- 
tions that  measure  hundreds  of  miles — yet  this 
gentleman  had  left  a  trail  of  hostility  from  the 
coast,  besides  a  record  for  both  Scotch  and  rye 
whiskey  that  could  hardly  be  surpassed.  He 
wore  khaki  clothes  and  a  Colt  with  a  nine  inch 
barrel  on  his  strolls  in  Sorata  and  he  published 
conspicuously  in  bad  Spanish  and  English, 
which  he  ordered  translated,  his  opinion  of  all, 
Bolivian,  Cholo,  Aymara,  or  American. 

His  company  had  committed  unutterable  fol- 
lies from  a  leather  director's  chair  seven  thou- 
sand miles  away  and  he  proposed  to  see  those  fol- 
lies carried  out  to  the  letter.  Sometimes  we 
have  wondered  why  our  efforts  in  South  Ameri- 
can trade  and  development  have  met  with  such 
scanty  success.  He  was  one  of  the  reasons. 
Rumors  came  that  he  had  become  hostile  to  our 
camp  down  the  river,  that  they  encroached  on 
his  privileges  or  were  using  men  whom  he  had 


270  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

contracted,  though  we  were  miles  from  his  prop- 
erties or  influence.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the 
leather  chair  directors  had  made  a  contract  for 
callapos  at  a  figure  below  cost  to  the  balseros — • 
and  for  an  advance  payment — and  had  been 
swindled.  The  leather  chair  directors  had 
merely  swindled  themselves  in  what  was  at  best 
an  oversharp  Yankee  bargain — and  in  a  country 
where  the  law  does  not  run  east  of  the  Andes 
and  only  primitive  justice  prevails!  In  default 
of  either  of  the  latter,  he  proposed  to  dictate  to 
any  one  who  went  into  the  montana  and  down 
the  river  when  and  how  they  might  or  might 
not  use  callapos  offered  by  balseros.  But  I  had 
at  that  time  other  things  to  think  of. 

A  pack  train  of  some  fifty  mules  with  supplies 
had  come  in  from  La  Paz  for  our  camp.  Also 
some  fifteen  Cholo  laborers,  and  a  mechanic  for 
the  camp  and  among  them  a  Jap,  a  queer,  silent, 
pink-cheeked  Jap.  He  was  immaculate  in  ap- 
pearance and  always  dapper ;  how  or  why  he  ever 
drifted  into  that  part  of  the  world  was  a  mystery. 
He  had  a  little  baggage  in  a  nice  little  lacquered 
box  which,  as  was  revealed  later  in  the  rainswept 
stone  hut  of  Tolopampa,  contained  the  secret  of 
his  pink  cheeks.     In  that  dull  dawn  he  had  out 


THE  INDIAN   UPRISING       271 

• 

a  little  mirror  and  a  bit  of  carmine  and  charcoal 
with  which  he  was  adding  beautifying  touches. 
On  down  the  river  in  camp  he  always  appeared 
the  same ;  but  he  was  a  fine  workman  and  could 
go  teetering  along  on  the  ridgepole  of  a  house 
as  easily  as  a  Lecco  could  run  along  the  river 
bank.  And  this  outfit  arrived  with  no  money  to 
pay  for  itself,  money  that  the  company  should 
have,  and  had  promised  to  send  in. 

The  agent  left  by  the  engineer  in  La  Paz  had 
sent  no  money  and  the  outfit  promptly  began  eat- 
ing its  head  off.  The  single  wire  that  irregularly 
kept  La  Paz  in  touch  with  Sorata  was  down — * 
very  likely  one  of  the  times  when  an  Aymara 
had  needed  some  wire  in  wrapping  his  iron 
ploughshare  fast  to  the  crooked  tree  trunk  or  for 
tying  on  his  roof  tree— and  I  could  not  reach  the 
agent.  Another  day  and  no  wire  fixed.  On 
the  third  came  the  news  from  the  village  of 
Illabaya,  some  fifteen  miles  away  that  the  Ay- 
maras  had  broken  loose  and  there  was  an  In- 
dian uprising.  From  the  valley  of  Sorata  we 
could  see  the  mountains  with  tiny  fires  flickering 
at  night,  apparently  as  signals,  and  occasionally 
an  Indian  driving  a  string  of  cattle  into  hiding 
along  some  far  off  Andean  trail.    The  house- 


272  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

holders  in  Sorata  began  storing  water  in  ollas  in 
their  patios  and  rifles  and  cartridges  tripled  in 
price.  And  still  there  was  no  wire  to  La  Paz 
by  which  either  I  or  the  intendente — who 
wanted  soldiers — could  get  a  message  through 
from  Sorata. 

The  men  were  boarded  out  and  money  was 
absolutely  essential  to  keep  their  rations  going 
and  to  pay  any  more  bills  that  might  come  in 
with  more  pack  trains.  Once  let  the  slightest 
suspicion  get  the  air  that  there  was  no  money  at 
hand  and  the  workmen  would  have  fled  like  quail 
and  it  would  have  been  a  matter  of  the  utmost 
difficulty  to  secure  them,  or  any  others,  again. 
It  meant  a  very  serious  emergency  for  the  camp. 
What  had  happened  in  La  Paz  I  did  not  know, 
but  it  became  imperative  to  find  out,  Aymara 
outbreak  or  not.  The  only  man  available  to  go 
with  me,  Skeffington,  was  a  great  tall  man,  pro- 
portionately built,  and  a  splendid  fellow,  whose 
weight  would  be  a  handicap  to  a  horse  in  any 
emergency.     So  I  decided  to  go  alone. 

I  started  at  dawn  on  a  little,  tough  mountain- 
bred  horse  and  had  passed  the  divide  early  in  the 
afternoon.  At  Huaylata  I  stopped  for  break- 
fast— a  tin  of  salmon  and  some  cakes  of  Ay- 


THE  INDIAN    UPRISING        273 

mara  bread — a  little  outside  the  sprawling  col- 
lection of  mud  huts,  and  an  Indian  woman  came 
out  and  sold  me  a  sheaf  of  barley  for  the  horse. 
There  were  no  signs  of  Indian  trouble  here. 
The  horse  ate  and  then  drank  and  as  he  finished 
drinking  he  threw  up  his  head  and  the  blood 
trickled  in  a  heavy  stream  from  his  nostrils  and 
he  trembled. 

If  the  horse  was  frightened  he  was  not  more 
so  than  I.  To  be  horseless  and  on  foot  in  an 
Indian  plain  and  with  the  uncertain  rumors  of 
Aymara  outbreaks  that  might  have  spread  like 
a  flame  among  that  dull,  hostile  population  was 
the  most  unpleasant  situation  I  have  ever  faced. 
The  little  Indian  towns  where  I  expected  to 
camp,  Copencara  and  the  tambo  of  Cocuta,  were 
safe  enough,  but  the  thought  of  getting  even  to 
Achicachi — where  I  might  be  able  to  get  a  fresh 
horse — gave  me  five  minutes  of  cold  and  clammy 
quivers  of  panic  at  the  pit  of  my  stomach.  The 
horse  stood  with  the  blood  dripping  in  a  steady 
patter  on  the  cold  ground  while  a  puddle  slowly 
grew  into  a  great  red  blot;  he  looked  at  me  with 
what,  to  my  understanding,  appeared  to  be  his 
final  vision  from  dulling  eyes;  the  straggling 
population  of  the  scattering  huts  of  Huaylata 


274  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

seemed  to  have  become  raised  to  the  final  power 
of  sinister  hostility;  there  was  no  doubt  that  I 
was  frightened.  I  took  a  box  of  cartridges  from 
my  saddle  bags  and  distributed  them  in  my 
pockets  so  their  weight  bore  evenly  and  waited. 
There  was  nothing  else  to  do.  There  was  no 
use  in  starting  on  foot  till  the  horse  was  surely; 
dead. 

Presently  the  horse  went  back  to  the  spring, 
took  a  little  drink,  and  then  turned  to  the  cebada 
and  began  nibbling.  I  felt  better  for  no  seri- 
ously deranged  animal  would  eat  in  its  final  mo- 
ments. The  trickling  of  blood  grew  less  and 
the  animal  showed  in  better  shape.  If  he  could 
only  last  to  Achicachi,  that  was  all  that  I  wanted. 

I  did  not  think  it  wise  to  start  on  foot  and 
leading  the  horse — that  would  advertise  the  fact 
that  I  was  crippled — while  I  could  wait  in 
Huaylata  without  betraying  anything  more  than 
a  sluggish  and  lazy  disposition.  I  tried  mount- 
ing at  last  and  the  horse  grunted  and  then  started 
slowly.  How  I  nursed  him  those  miles;  out  of 
sight  of  Huaylata  I  walked;  the  bleeding  had 
stopped,  but  he  seemed  weak;  I  took  his  tem- 
perature with  my  hand,  I  petted  him,  I  gave  him 
a  bite  of  chocolate,  and  when  any  Aymara  huts 


THE  INDIAN    UPRISING        275 

or  little  parties  hove  in  sight  I  mounted  and  rode 
by. 

Steadily  the  horse  Improved  and  at  times  re- 
sponded to  a  test  trot  without  difficulty  so  that 
I  rode  through  Achicachi  without  stopping. 
Only  once  had  I  had  the  sign  of  trouble  and  that 
was  a  little  group  of  Aymaras  near  the  begin- 
ning of  an  old  Inca  causeway  that  cuts  across  one 
arm  of  Lake  Titicaca.  They  were  drunk  and  I 
could  hear  snatches  of  their  thin,  wailing  songs 
while  they  were  still  dots  in  the  distance.  As  I 
rode  by  they  were  at  one  side  of  the  trail  where 
an  old  mud  building  held  forth  as  a  chicharia 
and  struggling  in  that  aimless  drunken  fashion 
that  seems  so  common  to  all  topers  and  that  di- 
vides all  wassailing  bands  into  those  prudent 
souls  who  are  already  drunk  enough  and  know  it 
and  those  who  won't  go  home  until  morning  or 
till  daylight,  or  the  day  after,  doth  appear. 
They  started  for  me  uncertainly,  one  reached  for 
a  stone,  but  an  Aymara  rushed  out  of  the  house 
and  knocked  it  from  his  hand.  Some  of  the 
more  sober  came,  too,  and  again  the  wrangling 
started,  apparently  as  to  whether  they  should 
rush  me  or  not.  And  in  the  meantime  I  had  rid- 
den out  of  reach. 


276  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

There  was  nothing  to  fear  in  that  incident, 
at  least  so  far  as  my  immediate  safety  had  been 
concerned.  But  the  critical  point  lay  in  avoid- 
ing trouble;  no  one  Indian  or  similar  group 
would  have  had  a  chance,  unarmed  as  they  were, 
against  any  man  with  a  gun,  but  in  a  peculiarly 
abrupt  Indian  fashion  the  countryside  is  aroused 
and  trouble  is  apt  to  close  in  on  the  trail  ahead  in 
a  particularly  congested  and  fatal  manner. 

I  had  planned  to  camp  in  Copencara,  but  the 
delay  left  me  plodding  along  in  the  cold  dark- 
ness and  I  was  glad  when  I  reached  Guarina. 
In  the  blackness  I  rode  into  a  pack-train  of 
sleepy  llamas  before  they  knew  it — or  I  either 
for  that  matter — and  on  the  instant  I  could  hear 
the  patter  and  thud  of  their  padded  feet  as  they 
scattered  in  a  panic  stricken  flight,  while  from 
out  of  the  night  came  the  hissing  herd-calls  of 
the  Aymara  drivers  trying  to  hold  them  together. 
Off  from  the  highway  that  led  through  the  town 
and  from  somewhere  beyond  the  walled  streets 
there  came  the  dull  beating  of  many  Aymara 
drums  and  the  mournful  tootling  of  their  flutes. 
Now  and  again  there  was  the  bang  of  a  dyna- 
mite cartridge  and  the  pop  of  firecrackers.  An 
Aymara  flitted  by  in  the  streets  and  I  called  to 


THE  INDIAN    UPRISING        277 

him  for  the  way  to  the  house  of  the  corregidor — 
the  chief  official.  All  I  could  get  of  his  reply 
was  the  respectful  "  Tata  "  as  he  disappeared. 

There  was  not  a  light  that  gleamed  through  a 
chink  in  any  window  or  door,  the  wretched 
streets  were  deserted,  and  only  the  noises  of  the 
fiesta  and  the  occasional  glow  from  a  big  bonfire 
down  some  alley  showed  where  the  only  signs 
of  life  existed.  It  was  possible  that  the  cor- 
regidor was  barricaded  in  his  house  as  in 
the  very  recent  affair  at  Illabaya  and  I  had  no 
mind  to  intrude  on  any  collection  of  Aymaras 
beating  tom-toms  and  raising  drunken  memories 
of  their  abused  ancestors.     It  looked  ominous. 

Presently  another  dim  figure  pattered  through 
the  darkness  and  again  I  asked  for  the  way  to  the 
corregidor.  The  Aymara  gave  explanations 
that  I  could  not  have  followed  in  daylight  and 
then  started  off  to  lead  the  way,  straight  down 
an  alley  to  the  plaza  where  were  the  bonfires 
and  the  drums  and  the  dancing  and  the  explo- 
sions. Along  one  side  we  skirted  until  the  far- 
ther side  was  reached.  It  was  a  big  plaza — al- 
most as  big  as  the  town — and  it  was  filled  with 
Aymaras  from  miles  around.  A  mass  of  shift- 
ing groups  shufHed  in  their  trotting  dance  around 


278  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

the  fires  and  hundreds  of  unattached  guests  wan- 
dered drunkenly  about  or  lay  stupefied  as  they 
fell  with  their  faithful  wife — or  wives — taking 
care  of  the  bottle  of  alcohol  till  they  should  re- 
vive afresh  and  athirst. 

At  one  end  of  this  plaza  my  guide  stopped,  he 
was  a  tattered  ragged  Aymara — a  pongo — a  car- 
rier of  water  and  of  the  lowest  caste,  and  left  me 
at  the  headquarters  of  the  corregidor  to  whom 
I  had  the  customary  right  of  the  country  to  ap- 
peal for  shelter.  When  there  is  no  corregidor 
you  go  to  the  padre.  He  was  a  Cholo,  a  heavy, 
thick-set  man  with  a  strong  face,  dressed  in  the 
ordinary  clothes  of  a  white  man,  whose  peculiar 
dull  complexion  alone  marked  him  as  Cholo. 
A  couple  of  tattered  police  lounged  in  the  door- 
way and  a  half  dozen  Cholos  were  idling  around 
this  headquarters.  A  Winchester  leaned  against 
the  corregidor's  chair,  some  of  the  others  car- 
ried theirs  as  they  shuffled  about,  and  back  in  the 
dimness  of  the  room  could  be  seen  extra  carbines 
leaning  against  the  walls,  and  from  every  belt 
there  was  the  bulge  under  the  coat  that  indicated 
a  revolver. 

The  corregidor  looked  at  me  curiously;  a  lone 
traveler  at  night  on  the  high  plateaus  in  these 


THE  INDIAN    UPRISING        279 

uncertain  times  and  speaking  bad  Spanish  was 
something  of  a  novelty.  One  of  the  ragged 
policemen  took  me  in  charge  and  once  again  I 
was  back  in  the  dark  alleys.  Before  a  door  in  a 
long  wall  we  stopped  and  then  a  rusty  key 
squeaked  and  both  horse  and  I  walked  through 
into  the  walled  patio  around  whose  sides  opened 
the  windowless  rooms.  The  policeman  brought 
in  a  bundle  of  cebada  for  my  horse  and  a  bowl  of 
native  Bolivian  soup-stew,  stinging  with  aji  and 
grateful  in  its  warmth.  For  the  food  and  forage 
I  paid,  but  for  the  house  and  shelter  the  cor- 
regidor  would  accept  nothing.  There  was  no 
bed  nor  did  I  need  any,  with  my  saddle  and 
blankets.  After  the  door  had  been  barricaded 
with  the  log  used  for  the  purpose,  I  was  asleep 
at  once  to  the  lulling  of  drums  and  flutes  and 
banging  dynamite. 


CHAPTER  XX 

AMBUSHED  BY  LADRONES 

EARLY  in  the  morning  I  was  off;  some  of 
the  celebrants  of  the  night  before  were 
strewn  along  the  streets,  still  drunk,  and 
among  them  the  sociable  hogs  rooted  or  wan- 
dered. The  horse  I  looked  over  anxiously,  but 
he  was  sound  as  a  dollar  and  even  a  little  frisky 
in  the  keen  air.  Once  in  a  while  an  Indian 
was  to  be  seen  plowing  a  tiny  patch  of  the  An- 
dean plateau  with  a  bull  and  a  crooked  tree 
trunk  or  here  and  there  a  single  iSgure  plodding 
the  trail.  In  the  afternoon  I  caught  up  with  a 
Spaniard,  the  manager  of  a  gold  mine  back  in 
the  mountains  he  said,  and  together  we  rode 
comfortably  along.  Until  we  met  I  had  no  idea 
of  the  enormous  craving  for  companionship  that 
can  develop  in  the  human  mind.  Bolivian 
fashion,  he  had  galloped  and  exhausted  his  horse 
in  the  early  morning  and  now  it  could  not  be 
urged  off  a  tired  walk. 

280 


AMBUSHED   BY  L'ADRONES      281 

^'t  Cocuta  we  stopped  and  had  a  little  supper, 
some  fried  eggs  and  a  hot  stew,  mainly  of  aji, 
while  the  horses  rested  with  loosened  girths. 
La  Paz  was  only  some  twelve  miles  distant  and 
to  the  edge  of  the  high  plain  from  which  its 
lights  could  be  seen  even  less.  I  was  going  on 
so  that  I  could  get  in  that  night.  The  Span- 
iard's idea  was  to  stop  in  one  of  the  mud  rooms 
of  the  tambo  and  ride  in,  freshened,  foam-be- 
decked, and  prancing  in  the  morning.  The 
mud  rooms,  acrid  with  llama-dung  smoke  from 
the  cooking  fires  and  infested  as  well,  made  no 
appeal  to  me.  My  companion  went  outside  to 
look  over  his  horse  and  came  back  in  a  state  of 
suppressed  excitement.  He  beckoned  me  over 
in  one  of  the  mud  rooms : 

"There  are  here  a  gang  of  ladrones — high- 
waymen," he  said.  "  We  must  go  on  at  once 
I  know  them.  They  killed  the  mail  carrier  on 
the  trail  last  month.  We  dare  not  stop  here — 
we  will  saddle  slowly  and  ride  on  as  if  we  had 
not  noticed  them.  Then  we  can  see  if  they  fol- 
low." 

We  tightened  the  girths  and  the  Spaniard's 
Indian  boy  picked  up  his  bundle  and  swung 
alongside  on  foot — he  could  keep  up  with  the 


282  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

horse  at  the  end  of  a  day's  march  on  the  trails. 
As  we  rode  out  of  the  corral  there  was  a  group 
of  Cholos  and  Bolivians  mud  spattered  and 
dusty  who  had  evidently  just  arrived.  Their 
animals  wandered  around  while  their  riders 
with  a  bottle  of  alcohol  and  some  bottles  of  na- 
tive beer  were  getting  drunk  as  rapidly  as  possi- 
ble. One  of  them  had  on  an  old  style  blue  army 
overcoat  of  the  United  States  and,  so  far  as  looks 
went,  they  easily  lived  up  to  the  reputation  of 
brigands  that  my  Spanish  friend  had  just  given 
them. 

The  interesting  question  for  us  was  whether 
they  would  follow  and  overtake  us.  The  cold 
afterglow  of  sunset  was  almost  at  our  backs  and 
we  carefully  watched  the  long,  level  horizon 
on  which  Cocuta  long  remained  in  sight  for 
signs  of  horsemen.  The  Spaniard  was  for 
covering  ground  as  fast  as  possible,  but  I  in- 
sisted on  keeping  to  a  walk;  his  horse  was  played 
out  and  needed  to  be  saved  up  to  the  last  minute 
if  we  were  really  in  for  a  bad  time. 

It  grew  dark,  and  the  thinnest  possible  silver 
of  moon  gave  only  an  accent  to  the  night.  No 
following  horsemen  had  appeared  and  we  were 
feeling  quite  relieved  when  the  Indian  boy  spoke 


AMBUSHED   BY  LADRONES      283 

to  the  Spaniard.  Off  on  our  right,  perhaps'  a 
couple  of  hundred  feet  from  the  trail  furrows, 
rode  a  little  group  of  horsemen.  There  were 
four  or  five,  in  the  night  it  was  uncertain,  but 
they  were  off  the  trail — for  nothing  that  one 
could  imagine  except  of  a  sinister  purpose  since 
everyone  follows  the  trail — and  suiting  their 
pace  to  ours,  were  walking  abreast  without  clos- 
ing in.  We  had  dismounted  to  ease  our  horses 
and  now  we  climbed  back  into  the  saddles.  The 
figures  did  not  close  in  nor  did  they  give  any  sign. 
"  They  are  trying  to  count  us,"  said  my  friend, 
and  then  he  added,  "  have  you  another  pistol, 
senor,  one  that  you  could  lend  me — I  have  not 


one." 


I  had  not.  And  I  remember  to  this  day  the 
cold,  clammy  undulations  of  my  spine  as  I  real- 
ized that  the  only  gun  between  us  belonged  to 
me  and  that  whatever  responsibilities  the  situa- 
tion developed  the  field  of  action  was  also  to  be 
wholly  mine. 

The  hold-up  in  these  parts  is  not  practiced 
with  the  gentle  chivalry  of  the  "  hands  up  "  or 
stand-and-deliver  method;  you  are  first  shot  up 
and,  if  the  aim  has  been  successful  from  the 
chosen   ambush,    your    remains    are    searched. 


284  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Spanish — or  the  surviving  Bolivian  procedure 
— places  a  very  high  value  on  the  testimony  of 
surviving  principals,  so  much  so  that  one  of  the 
effects  of  any  form  of  hold-up  is  to  see  that  there 
are  no  surviving  principals. 

The  little  figures  off  the  trail  kept  pace  with  us 
and  gave  no  sign.  Presently  they  gradually 
quickened  their  gait  and  disappeared  in  the 
darkness  ahead.  The  Spaniard  laid  his  hand 
softly  on  my  arm : 

"  They  have  gone  ahead  to  await  us  in  an 
arroyo,  senor,"  he  said.  "  Be  sure  that  your 
pistol  is  in  order.'' 

These  arroyos  are  gashes  in  the  high  plateau, 
sometimes  only  six  or  eight  feet  deep  and  more 
often  deep  gullies  with  a  dried  watercourse  at 
the  bottom  into  which  one  rides  in  steep  zigzags 
like  the  mountain  trails,  and  by  reason  of  having 
the  only  gun  it  became  my  part  to  ride  ahead. 
Presently  we  came  to  one — deep  and  as  dark  as 
the  inside  of  a  cow.  There  was  nothing  else 
to  do  so  I  cocked  my  gun,  a  forty-four,  Russian 
model,  and  shoved  the  spurs  in  so  that  my  horse 
would  take  the  trail,  down  into  the  arroyo  first. 
There  was  not  a  sound  except  the  rattle  of  stones 
from  my  horse's  feet;  there  was  not  a  thing  that 


AMBUSHED   BY  LADRONES      285 

could  be  seen  in  the  darkness ;  I  was  on  edge  for 
the  slightest  sound. 

"  If  you  hear  a  sound,  senor,  shoot! ''  said  my 
fellow  traveler  as  I  spurred  ahead. 

It  seemed  an  age  before  I  rode  out  on  the  plain 
on  the  other  side — and  it  was  only  a  little  arroyo. 
And  there  were  some  eight  or  ten  more  of  these 
ahead.  How  many  we  passed  I  do  not  remem- 
ber, but  it  was  from  the  opposite  bank  of  one 
deep  gully  that  I  heard  the  rattle  of  displaced 
gravel  and  I  swung  my  gun  into  the  direction  of 
the  sound  and  blazed  away.  Down  the  last 
slope  of  the  near  side  my  horse  slid  and  then  in 
a  rattling  gallop  stumbling  and  pitching  over 
the  dried  watercourse  on  up  the  opposite  side 
while  I  banged  away  in  the  direction  of  the  first 
sound.  More  gravel  poured  down  and  then 
there  came  the  sounds  of  scurrying  and  of  hoof 
beats  pounding  on  hard  ground.  Close  behind 
me  came  the  Spaniard  in  a  clatter  of  flying  stones 
and  still  further  behind  the  noise  of  his  Indian 
boy  scuttling  down  the  bank  and  trying  to  keep 
up. 

On  the  farther  bank  we  halted  and  took  stock. 
To  this  day  I  do  not  know  how  many  shots  I 
fired  for  I  broke  the  gun,  dumped  out  all  the 


286  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

shells,  and  reloaded  without  taking  stock  of  ex- 
pended ammunition.  But  the  tension  was  gone ; 
we  looked  at  each  other  in  the  darkness  and  the 
rest  of  the  trail  seemed  easy. 

"  They  will  not  likely  appear  again,"  he  said. 
"  But  there  are  one  or  two  bad  places  yet." 

There  were;  narrow  zigzags  with  sharp  turns 
guarded  by  jutting  rocks  where  a  man  could  be 
hidden  until  the  horse  pivoted  for  the  sharp  turn 
and  this  constant  riding  with  a  cocked  gun  into 
a  black  gash  that  maybe  contained  something 
that  never  appeared  wore  on  the  nerves.  How 
much  I  did  not  know  until,  as  we  rode  into  the 
outskirts  of  La  Paz,  a  couple  of  fighting  bulls 
broke  loose  in  the  streets  and  a  loose  fighting 
bull  is  very  dangerous.  A  man  on  horseback 
was  perfectly  safe,  but  at  the  shrill,  terrified 
cries  of  ''  los  toros!  los  torosf ''  and  the  low  bel- 
low of  the  bulls,  I  spurred  on  a  law-breaking 
gallop  through  the  streets  of  La  Paz  and  did  not 
stop  until  I  had  clattered  into  the  patio  of  the 
hotel.     My  nerve  was  gone. 

The  trouble  over  the  lack  of  company  funds 
was  soon  located.  Our  agent  in  La  Paz,  a  hard 
drinking  old  man  of  many  exaggerated  polite- 
nesses and  a  teller  of  tales  that  began  with  a 
British  commission  in  a  Bengal  lancers  regiment 


AMBUSHED  BY  LADRONES      287 

and  drifted  through  Sioux  and  Blackfeet  raids,  a 
man  who  was  utterly  delightful  across  a  club 
table,  had  been  seized  with  a  madness  for  power. 
The  poor  old  fellow,  as  honest  as  he  was  shift- 
less, a  genteel  drifter  for  years,  had  become  an 
appointed  and  accredited  resident  agent  and 
with  a  full  company  cash  box  felt  for  the  first 
time  in  years  the  thrill  of  responsibility  as 
"  agent "  and  had  been  for  days  shifting  from 
club  to  hotel  and  back  to  the  club  maudlin  with 
boasts  and  Scotch-and-sodas.  It  did  not  take 
long  to  straighten  out  affairs  and  soon  I  was 
headed  for  the  interior. 

Once  more  I  was  back  in  Sorata.  One  of  the 
men,  our  only  mechanic,  an  Englishman,  was 
quarantined  in  a  little  house  on  the  outskirts, 
down  with  the  smallpox.  We  had  shared  the 
room  in  the  Sorata  posada  together  before  I 
started  across  the  high  plain,  and  he  had  become 
sick  twenty-four  hours  after  I  left.  The  inten- 
dente  of  Sorata  was  irritated  at  him,  he  was  some 
trouble  with  his  smallpox.  They  had  locked  an 
old  Indian  woman  in  the  house  on  the  outskirts 
to  which  he  had  been  removed  and  kept  a  guard 
at  the  door  so  she  could  not  escape.  She  was 
cook  and  nurse. 

The  queer  official  government  doctor  who  ran 


288  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

a  queer  medicine  shop  and  barely  kept  alive  un- 
der the  government  subsidy,  shuffled  up  to  the 
house  each  day  and  called  inquiries  through  the 
window  that  were  answered  by  the  sick  man. 
Fortunately  he  was  not  very  ill,  and  he  pulled 
through.  While  the  peeling  or  shedding  process 
was  on  we  would  go  up  and  sit  across  the  alley 
from  his  window  and  smoke  some  pipes  with  the 
patient. 

At  night  he  used  to  be  annoyed  while  he  was 
helpless,  by  the  Aymaras,  who  would  hold  little 
dances  and  celebrations  under  his  windows,  toot- 
ing the  doleful  flutes  and  beating  the  drums. 
While  he  was  sickest  he  was  helpless ;  one  of  his 
first  messages  was  to  the  intendente  to  chase  off 
the  Indians.  It  had  the  usual  result — nothing. 
His  first  convalescent  act  was  to  crawl  over  to  the 
window  one  night  with  his  gun  and  open  fire. 
Two  muffled  echoes  from  the  night  proved  that 
he  had  punctured  two  drums  and  he  was  left  in 
peace.  True,  the  Aymaras  complained  but  the 
intendente  came  back  with  the  information  that 
a  crazy  smallpox  patient  was  a  free  agent  and 
they  had  better  keep  away.  Thereafter  no  more 
drums  or  flutes  broke  the  night's  peace. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  MUSIC  OF  THE  AYMARAS 

THIS  Indian  music  is  interesting  and  I  was 
fortunate  in  being  able  to  have  some  pre- 
served in  musical  form  for  repetition.  In 
the  remains  of  the  vast  Indian  nation  shattered 
by  Pizarro,  the  Empire  of  the  Incas,  every  man 
and  boy,  almost  from  the  age  v^hen  he  can  walk, 
is  an  adept  on  their  simple  reed  flutes  and  Pan- 
(dean  pipes;  the  drum  he  merely  thumps.  They 
are  a  musical  race;  there  are  songs  and  airs  for 
each  season,  for  the  planting,  for  the  harvest,  for 
the  valorous  deeds  of  the  vanished  caciques,  for 
their  gods  of  old  to  whom  a  new  significance  has 
been  given  by  a  pious  Church,  and  the  long- 
drawn  chants  by  means  of  which,  at  their  yearly 
gatherings,  they  pass  down  the  history  of  their 
race.  As  there  is  no  written  language,  there  is 
no  written  music;  it  is  handed  down  from  gen- 
eration to  generation  by  the  ear  alone. 

Their  national  instruments  are  but  three  in 


290  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

number:  the  flute — a  reed  about  eighteen  inches 
in  length,  with  six  holes,  and  a  square  slit  at  the 
end  for  a  mouthpiece,  played  after  the  manner 
of  a  clarionet;  the  Pandean  pipes — a  series  of 
seven  reed  tubes  that,  in  the  large  ones,  are  four 
feet  in  length,  and  in  the  smaller  ones  scarcely 
as  many  inches ;  and  the  drum.  The  last  is  the 
universal  instrument  of  all  peoples;  there  are 
few  races  so  low  in  the  scale  of  human  society  as 
not  to  possess  it.  The  Pandean  pipes  are  in  a 
double  row,  and  at  the  time  of  preparation  for 
the  Indiads,  or  the  intertribal  wars,  the  outer 
series  is  filled  with  canassa,  the  native  liquor,  and 
the  player  receives  the  benefit  of  the  intoxicating 
fumes  without  the  delay  incidental  to  drinking 
from  the  bottle.  Only  the  men  play,  the  women 
and  girls  never;  their  part  is  in  the  chanting  and 
in  the  hand-clapping  that  measures  the  weird 
rhythm,  although  before  marriage  the  girls  are 
allowed  to  join  in  the  dances  and  the  drinking 
that  goes  with  them. 

In  the  cities  and  villages  there  are  the  con- 
stant beating  of  the  drums  and  sound  of  the 
flutes.  Every  community  or  group  has  its 
special  festival  days.  Now  it  is  a  wedding  or  a 
christening  with  the  hosts  of  "compadres" — 


THE  MUSIC  OF  THE  AYMARAS      291 

godfathers — or  the  Church  day  of  some  obscure 
saint  celebrated  by  the  mission  padre,  then  a  vil- 
lage fiesta  or  house-raising,  and  from  day  to  day 
the  sounds  of  barbaric  strains  stretch  in  an  end- 
less chain  throughout  the  year.  In  riding  over 
the  high  plains  in  the  Indian  country  one  is 
seldom  beyond  the  sound  of  the  thin  flutes. 
Every  llama  and  sheep  herder  passes  the 
monotonous  hours  with  his  playing.  In  the  still 
air  it  carries  for  miles  and  softens  in  the  long 
distances  with  a  weird  pleasing  effect.  The 
strain  is  short,  but  one  bar,  and  for  hours  it  is  re- 
peated with  unvarying  exactness. 


Even  in  the  bitter  cold  and  snow  of  the  trails 
of  the  high  passes  the  presence  of  the  Indians 
is  announced  long  before  their  appearance  by  the 
echoing  flutes.  They  plod  along  in  single  file, 
muffled  in  their  ponchos,  driving  the  llamas  or 
burros  before  them;  one  of  them  supplies  the 
music,  but  as  the  air  is  thin  in  these  high  alti- 
tudes and  breath  is  precious,  they  relieve  each 
other  at  frequent  intervals.    There  is  no  marked 


292 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


cadence  to  the  music ;  it  is  a  weary  minor  air  un- 
like the  sturdy  measures  we  associate  with 
marching  music,  but  it  undoubtedly  stimulates 
its  audience  in  some  mysterious  way  with  an  in- 
spiring effect. 


But  it  is  in  the  great  fiestas  that  one  has  the 
best  opportunity  of  hearing  the  Indian  music.  I 
was  waiting  in  the  Indian  town  of  Achicachi  for 
the  arrival  of  my  mule  to  carry  me  over  the  pass 
to  the  village  of  Sorata.  The  fiesta  was  for  the 
birthday  of  the  town  and  in  honor  of  the  an- 
cient gods  of  the  place;  at  daybreak  the  In- 
dians gathered  within  its  walls  from  miles. 

With  the  light  of  dawn  the  streets  began  filling 
with  dancing  bands  of  Indians  in  their  gaudy 
festival  attire.  They  were  there  in  thousands. 
The  plaza  was  a  weaving  mass  of  brilliant 


THE  MUSIC  OF  THE  AYMARAS      293 

ponchos  and  feathers;  Indians  with  contorted 
masks,  and  jaguar-skins  trailing  from  their 
shoulders,  performed  dances  in  the  cramped 
spaces  cleared  for  their  benefit;  silver  and  gold 
bullion  decorations  glinted  in  the  clear  atmos- 
phere along  with  cheap  tinsel  and  tin  mirrors ; 
and  above  all  rose  the  sound  of  the  Pandean 
pipes,  the  flutes,  and  the  drums,  filling  the  air 
with  a  confused  discordant  roar. 

Often  several  groups  of  Indians  would  band 
together  and  in  single  file  follow  the  pipes  and 
drums  m  a  little  jerky,  dancing  step.  Some- 
times they  went  through  simple  evolutions, 
figure  eights  and  circles,  or  divided  and  came 
together  in  the  pattern  of  the  "  grand  march  " 
of  the  East  Side  balls.  The  players  would 
dance  as  well,  and  occasionally  some  inspired 
individual  would  halt  the  line  while  he  whirled 
dizzily  around  in  one  spot  to  his  own  music. 
The  others  would  watch  these  performances 
with  approval,  chanting  in  a  high  wailing  key 
and  clapping  their  hands  in  accompaniment. 

With  the  darkness  of  the  night  the  dancing 
and  playing  in  the  plaza  became  less  and  less. 
The  groups  withdrew  to  their  'dobe  huts  and 
squatted  on  the  mud  floors.     A  tallow  dip  or  a 


294 


ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


smoky  wick  floating  in  a  dish  of  grease  fur- 
nished what  light  there  was.  The  wind  from 
Lake  Titicaca  blew  fresh  and  keen,  but  in  the 
lurid  gloom  of  their  squalid  huts  the  air  was 
foul  with  the  crowded  Aymaras.  The  chant- 
ing took  the  place  of  the  dance,  and  the  flutes 
and  pipes  led  in  the  air;  the  drums  were  silent. 
With  the  finish  of  each  verse  or  section  the  note 
ended  in  a  prolonged  maudlin  wail  that  con- 
tinued until  it  became  the  opening  note  of  the 
succeeding  stanza. 


f¥H-lrrH4 


THE  MUSIC  OF  THE  AYMARAS      295 

This  song  is  also  popular  with  the  Cholos — 
the  half-breeds.  They  hate  the  whites,  and 
sing  it  with  either  Spanish  or  Aymara  words 
of  foul  denunciation.  In  Sorata  one  time  they 
marched  past  below  my  window,  singing  it  for 
my  benefit.  Between  verses  they  cursed  the 
"  gringos "  in  vulgar  Spanish. 

It  was  in  this  same  village  of  Sorata  that  I 
was  present  at  its  greatest  Indian  fiesta.  It  is 
the  fiesta  of  the  harvest  and  generally  lasts  for 
an  entire  week.  The  mission  padre  pronounces 
it  the  feast  of  Todos  Santos,  but  to  the  Indians 
that  is  a  matter  of  indifference.  The  maize  and 
the  "choque"  (potatoes)  have  been  gathered, 
and  the  "chalona"  (frozen  mutton)  prepared 
for  the  ensuing  season;  the  year  has  ended;  it  is 
the  fiesta  of  the  harvest.  They  go  to  confession 
on  the  morning  of  the  first  day,  but  the  re- 
mainder is  spent  in  their  own  customs. 

The  little  parties  organized  themselves  after 
the  early-morning  visit  to  the  'dobe  church  and 
paraded  with  their  odd  trotting  dance-steps 
through  the  lanes  of  the  town.  There  was  the 
usual  collection  of  thin  drums  and  shrill  flutes, 
with  here  and  there  the  mellower  tone  of  a  Pan- 
dean pipe.    One  band  stood  out  conspicuously 


296 


ACROSS  THE   ANDES 


in  the  crowding  throngs.  This  band  had  been 
carefully  trained  by  its  host,  who  did  not  play 
himself,  but  with  a  proud  dignity  directed  its 
evolutions.  A  huge  Aymara  headed  the  party; 
he  played  Pandean  pipes  with  tubes  four  feet  in 
length.  A  great  drum  swung  by  a  rawhide 
thong  from  his  shoulders.  Its  shell  was  from  a 
log,  the  core  of  which  had  been  burned  out. 
Following  him  was  the  line  of  Indians  in  a  re- 
ducing scale,  each  with  a  smaller  set  of  pipes 
and  a  smaller  drum. 

Each  Indian  contributed  but  a  few  notes  to 
the  air;  the  range  of  the  pipe  was  limited.  The 
drums  never  rested;  they  marked  the  sonorous 
rhythm  of  the  measures.  The  training  was  per- 
fect; there  was  never  a  break  in  the  succession 
of  notes ;  the  effect  was  much  like  that  of  a  cal- 
liope, but  more  mellowed  and  pleasing.  They 
played  but  two  airs,  and  these  seemed  to  be  re- 
served for  that  peculiar  form  of  orchestra. 


^^ 


THE  MUSIC  OF  THE  AYMARAS      297 


This  they  would  play  for  hours  before  chang- 
ing to  the  other,  as  follows : 


White  squares  of  cloth  hung  from  the  shoul- 
ders of  the  players  like  the  capes  of  the  old 
Crusaders,  and  with  their  brilliant  new  ponchos 


298  ACROSS    THE   ANDES 

and  the  bright  green  of  the  parrot-feather  dec- 
orations they  made  a  most  picturesque  effect. 
The  weird  and  barbaric  music  was  rather  at- 
tractive at  first  as  it  rose  from  the  distance  and 
swelled  in  volume  while  the  procession  came 
nearer,  but  after  eight  or  ten  hours  it  palled, 
and  the  prospect  of  a  week  more  of  it  was  not 
cheerful.  But  an  outbreak  in  the  Indian  town 
of  Illabaya,  ten  miles  off  over  the  mountains, 
brought  it  to  a  close  much  earlier. 

To  Mrs.  Arthur  T.  Jackson,  of  Boston,  the 
wife  of  a  prominent  rubber-dealer  in  Bolivia, 
who  was  in  Sorata  at  the  time,  the  only  white 
woman  within  hundreds  of  miles,  I  am  in- 
debted  for  the  transcript  of  the  Indian  music. 
An  accomplished  musician,  she  was  much  in- 
terested in  the  subject,  and  at  different  times 
during  her  months  on  the  Indian  frontiers  she 
had  gathered  and  noted  the  airs  as  she  heard 
them  in  the  fiestas. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

BACK  HOME 

MORE  difficulty  developed  when  I,  in  an 
amiable  frame  of  mind  bought  a  chance 
in  a  watch  from  a  Sorata  man,  for  when 
a  man  moves  from  a  village  he  raffles  off  all  his 
household  goods  and  his  own  and  his  wife's 
jewelry.  This  raffle  was  made  famous  by  the 
fact  that  I  won  something.  I  won  the  watch; 
and  the  next  morning  was  arrested  by  the  in- 
tendente  on  the  complaint  of  a  thrifty  Soratan- 
ian  that  the  whole  machinery  of  the  raffle  had 
been  undermined  and  debauched,  and  Bolivia 
dishonored  in  order  that  the  dice  might  give  me 
this  marvelous  watch.  The  watch,  by  the  way 
— I  will  keep  it  for  years  as  proof  that  I  am 
Fortune's  favorite — did  strongly  resemble  gold 
in  a  dim  light  and  when  wound  would  tick  for 
quite  a  while,  but  in  its  general  aspect  was  on 

the  order  of  those  given  as  a  premium  with  two 

299 


300  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

cakes  of  scented  soap  for  a  quarter  by  the  slick 
corner  spieler  of  a  gang  of  pickpockets. 

At  last  we  were  to  start  the  next  day  over  the 
pass  to  Mapiri  with  our  outfit  and  men.  The 
surly  American  with  his  ever-present  extraordi- 
narily long  barrel  Colt  sent  a  messenger  to  me 
to  announce  that  his  home  office,  easy  chair, 
contract  on  the  Mapiri  River  happened  to  cover 
ajl  of  the  available  balsas  and  callapos  and  that 
I  could  not  use  any.  Presently  we  met  in  the 
plaza  and  he  remarked  with  a  suggestive 
emphasis,  "  You  got  my  message  about  my  cal- 
lapos? "  I  replied  briefly  that  I  had  and  that  I 
would  act  as  my  judgment  dictated  when  I  ar- 
rived in  Mapiri.  "  Very  well,"  he  said  sugges- 
tively; ''then  you  know  the  consequences  and 
can  take  them." 

That  night  a  friend  came  to  our  party  with 
the  information  that  this  man  had  shipped  in  to 
his  barraca  recently  some  dozen  Winchesters 
and  considerable  ammunition  and  that  he  was 
arranging  to  ship  more.  That  gave  their  bar- 
raca some  twenty-six  rifles — a  pretty  heavy 
armament  for  merely  a  peaceful  rubber  com- 
pany. His  ignorance  of  the  country  and  his 
truculent  vanity  and  the  carelessness  with  which 


BACK  HOME  301 

he  talked  "  fight,"  drunk  or  sober,  made  it  a  mat- 
ter of  no  little  concern.  And  he  neither  knew 
nor  respected  the  rights  and  customs  of  river 
travel,  although  he  attempted  to  dictate  them. 

Like  many  patriots  he  was  willing  to  fight  as 
long  as  he  could  hire  his  fighting  done  for  him 
— an  absentee  bravo. 

We  bought  four  Mausers  and  a  thousand 
rounds  of  ammunition  and  started  back  to  our 
camp,  with  five  white  men  and  some  thirty-five 
Cholo  workmen  and  three  pack-trains  of  sup- 
plies. 

Once  again  we  climbed  sleepily  into  the 
saddles  at  daybreak  and  began  crawling  up  to 
the  final  pass  over  this  third  and  last  great 
range  of  the  Andes.  The  first  night's  camp  was 
hardly  below  the  snow  line  in  a  little  sheltered 
cove  on  the  mountain  flank;  the  next  morning 
a  slippery  climb  in  a  blizzard  that  coated  every 
mule  in  ice  as  though  with  armor  brought  us  to 
a  ragged,  narrow  cleft  in  a  long  fin  of  rock 
through  which  we  passed  as  through  a  gateway. 
It  was  the  summit  of  the  pass.  There  was  on 
the  farther  side  the  usual  votive  cairn  of  stones 
built  by  the  Aymaras  with  the  twig  cross  at  its 
apex  while,  leaning  against  the  fin  of  protrud- 


302  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

ing  rock  as  far  as  the  eyes  could  penetrate  the 
blizzard,  were  narrow,  spear-head  pieces  of 
shale  placed  on  end  as  further  efforts  in  wor- 
ship or  propitiation  of  the  great  god  of  the 
mountain. 

From  the  pass  the  trail  dropped  a  trifle  and 
we  crowded  for  that  night  into  the  tambo  in 
Yngenio.  They  were  a  surly  lot  and  viewing 
with  a  hostile  suspicion — doubtless  with  causes 
inherited  from  the  remote  past  of  the  conquis- 
tadores — any  outfit  of  wayfarers. 

Again  followed  a  day  of  sleet  and  snow-squall 
with  an  occasional  rift  in  the  clouds  when,  thou- 
sands of  feet  below,  could  be  seen  the  soft  greens 
and  the  waving  palms  of  inviting  tropical 
warmth  and  dryness.  The  narrow  trail  zig- 
zagged up  the  bare  mountain  steeps,  followed 
for  a  distance  the  wanderings  of  the  crest,  and 
then  dropped  in  another  series  of  zigzags  to 
lower  levels.  For  hours  there  was  this  constant 
rise  and  fall.  In  a  cold  rain  we  camped  in  a 
stone  hut,  Tolopampa,  a  place  that  has  the  re- 
putation of  perpetual  mud  and  rain  where  the 
skull  of  some  deserted  Aymara  packer  still 
kicked  around  in  the  cold  mud  outside. 

And  then  at  daybreak  began  the  drop  into 


BACK  HOME  303 

the  warmer  zones  where  there  was  sunlight  and 
a  riot  of  tropical  color.  For  two  days  it  was 
one  unbroken  descent  while  the  back  grew  weary 
and  exhausted  leaning  against  the  cantle  and  the 
stirrups  interfered  with  the  mule's  waggling 
ears.  The  clayey  mud  of  the  wallowing  trails 
rose  up  and  wrapped  us  in  its  welcome  until 
boot-lacings,  spur  and  puttee  buckles  blended  in 
shapeless,  indistinguishable  masses.  And  then, 
five  days  after  leaving  Sorata,  we  plodded  into 
the  straggling  line  of  palm  thatched  huts  that 
is  credited  on  Bolivian  maps  with  being  the 
town  of  Mapiri.  For  two  days  the  mules  were 
rested  while  the  arrieros  passed  the  time  in 
keeping  mildly  drunk.  Below  the  high  bank  on 
which  the  town  stood,  the  River  Mapiri  boiled 
past  in  muddy  eddies;  here  in  a  cane  hut  we 
camped  and  oiled  and  packed  the  saddles ;  from 
now  on  It  would  be  rafts,  callapos,  until  we 
again  reached  the  main  camp. 

In  Mapiri  the  callapos  were  waiting  and  we 
embarked.  One  camp  on  a  sand  bar,  one  camp 
in  Guanai  and  the  next  day  we  shot  more  rapids 
and  came  into  the  country  of  the  truculent  one 
with  the  long  barreled  Colt.  The  barraca  lay 
just  around  the  bend  where  the  river  broke  in 


304  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

some  small  rapids  and  then  saved  itself  in  miles 
of  smoothly  coiling  eddies  for  the  grand  smother 
of  the  Ratama.  It  was  here  at  this  chief  bar- 
raca  of  his  company  that  there  might  be  trouble 
''—we  had  been  warned  that  if  we  attempted  to 
round  this  bend  in  any  unapproved,  uncensored 
callapos  we  would  be  fired  on.  The  four 
Mausers  had  been  issued  and  the  case  of  am- 
munition unscrewed.  There  were  four  callapos 
with  the  white  men  on  the  one  in  the  lead.  It 
was  rather  exciting,  this  uncertainty,  but  it  was 
accompanied  by  the  invariably  clammy  spinal 
undulations  and  the  strong  desire  that  I  was 
somewhere  else  or  that  what  that  jungled  river 
bed  held  for  us  was  an  incident  of  the  past  rather 
than  of  this  imminence. 

As  though  casually  the  freight  had  been 
loaded  on  the  callapo  platforms  so  that  it  made 
an  informal  breastwork  and  quite  as  informally 
we  loafed  behind  it.  And  then  the  callapos 
drifted  silently  around  the  bend — we  had  not 
fired  the  salute  that  is  ordinarily  made  when  ap- 
proaching a  barraca  at  which  one  is  going  to 
stop  and  call — and  the  clearing  with  its  collec- 
tions of  huts  and  palm  thatched  roofs  broke  into 
view.     A  little  figure  scuttled  across  the  clear- 


BACK  HOME  305 

ing  and  disappeared.  The  edge  of  the  clearing 
on  the  bank  was  within  a  stone's  strow  and  not 
a  sound  broke  the  stillness.  A  word  to  the  Lec- 
cos  and  their  heavy  paddles  began  working  us 
over  to  the  bank  where  a  little  path  ran  down  to 
the  water's  edge.  If  the  two  camps  were  in  for 
a  frontier  war,  a  feud,  it  might  as  well  be  found 
out  at  once.  Before  there  had  been  only  the 
threats  of  a  foolish  man — here  was  the  place  and 
here  were  the  men  under  his  control.  How  far 
would  they  back  his  stupidities? 

In  single  file  we  climbed  the  steep  path  to  the 
clearing;  at  the  top  the  head  man  came  for- 
ward cordially. 

"  What's  this  about  firing  on  us  as  we  came 
around  the  bend — you  getting  in  Winchesters 
by  the  crate?  " 

He  laughed  cheerfully: 

"Oh,  phut!  If  it  amuses  that  old  fool  outside 
to  send  them  in  I  don't  mind,  but  if  he  wants 
to  start  any  fighting  let  him  come  on  in  and  do 
it  himself." 

We  told  him  of  the  rumors  and  the  threats 
that  came  from  Sorata. 

"Sure,  I  know,"  he  said;  "that  old  cuss 
didn't  do  much  else  but  talk  fight  with  me  when 


3o6  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

I  was  out;  how  many  rifles,  how  we're  going  to 
run  things — you  know  him — and  I'll  bet  he's 
never  heard  anything  more  than  a  firecracker 
go  off  in  his  life.  He'd  fire  me  if  he  thought  I 
had  you  at  my  table.  Bring  up  the  hammocks 
and  come  on  into  grub!  " 

And  so  like  most  other  really  serious  things 
it  faded  away  on  a  close  approach.  But  it  had 
held  all  of  the  serious  elements. 

The  next  morning  we  swung  out  into  the  river 
and  again  shot  the  rapids  of  the  Ratama  and 
drifted  out  where  the  whirlpools  drew  the  cal- 
lapos  under  neck-deep.  As  we  approached  the 
site  of  our  camp  we  turned  loose  the  rifles  and 
shortly  came  the  answering  pop  of  guns.  The 
callapos  grounded  on  the  shallows  at  the  foot  of 
the  bank,  the  old  Cholo  workmen  swarmed 
around  the  new  comers  and  waded  ashore  with 
the  new  freight.  Where  we  had  left  the  begin- 
nings of  a  palm  thatched  roof  was  a  long  bunk- 
house  ;  a  patch  of  young  platanos  was  opening 
its  long  leaves  with  its  promise  of  our  own  base 
of  supplies;  a  hen  clucked  around  with  one  lone 
chick — the  rest  having  succumbed  to  snakes — 
the  result  of  some  trading  with  the  cacique ;  un- 
der a  palm  thatch  there  drifted  the  blue  wisps 


BACK  HOME  307 

of  smoke  from  a  bank  of  charcoal  burning  and 
a  well  defined  trail  stretched  through  the  jungle 
to  a  clearing  farther  down  where  the  placer 
workings  would  be  finally  located. 

It  was  like  the  Swiss  family  Robinson — it  was 
coming  home.  The  Cholo  with  the  one  silver 
eye,  the  drunken  shoemaker  with  the  scalloped 
scar,  and  all  the  others  crowded  around  and 
chattered  in  a  happy  excitement.  The  proper 
native  custom  is  to  celebrate  so  according  to 
formula  a  tin  of  alcohol  was  ordered  for  the 
night  and  the  workmen  decked  themselves  with 
leaves  and  shuffled  round  in  what  passes  for  a 
dance  until  exhausted.  The  next  day  the  time 
expired  ones  started  up-river  with  the  callapos. 

It  had  been  five  months  since  I  left  the  camp 
and  we  began  that  slow,  heart-breaking  struggle 
against  the  current.  It  was  with  all  the  feelings 
of  having  at  last  reached  my  restful  home  that  I 
turned  into  my  hammock  that  night.  Rapidly 
the  camp  grew  under  the  influx  of  the  new  men; 
the  song  of  the  whip-saw  rose  in  the  forest  and 
long  clean  timbers  began  piling  themselves 
along  the  trail;  now  and  again  the  roar  of  some 
huge  tree  shook  the  air  as  it  mowed  a  swath  of 
jungle  in  its  fall;  a  tiny  store  was  opened  and 


3o8  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

now  and  again  Leccos  came  to  trade — out  from 
the  original  jungle  of  the  year  before  had  come 
a  tiny,  fragmentary  community  hanging  on  to 
the  frontier. 

And  three  weeks  later  I  started  on  a  callapo 
down  the  river  to  cross  the  interior  basin  of 
South  America,  over  the  Falls  of  the  Madeira 
and  then  down  the  Amazon  and  to  London. 
Two  days  and  two  night  camps  with  a  callapo 
and  a  crew  of  Leccos  and  one  forenoon  we 
drifted  and  scraped  on  the  gravel  beach  of  Rur- 
renabaque.  Here  was  the  last  touch  of  a  town, 
or  of  a  straggling  settlement  that  I  would  sleep 
in  for  many  days. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

OFF  ACROSS  THE  CONTINENT  IN  A  BATALON 

A  clumsy  cart,  with  its  two  wheels  cross-cut 
from  a  single  mahogany  log,  and  slowly 
dragged  by  a  pair  of  mud  covered  oxen, 
crawled  across  the  open  space  before  the  settle- 
ment that  had  been  left,  after  the  Spanish  cus- 
tom, in  crude  reminder  of  a  plaza.  Under  the 
midday  tropic  sun  the  quivering  heat-waves 
boiled  up  from  the  baking  ground  and  through 
them  the  straggling  line  of  high-peaked,  palm- 
thatched,  cane  houses  shimmered  in  the  glare. 
Under  the  torrent  of  heat  the  jungle  sounds 
were  silenced,  and  only  in  the  distance,  from 
the  river's  edge,  came  the  splashing  and  clat- 
ter of  the  Tacana  woman,  with  the  happy 
shrieks  of  the  sun-proof,  naked  babies. 

The  wooden  axles  of  the  cart  cried  aloud 
for  grease  as  a  ragged  Tacana  prodded  the  lum- 
bering oxen ;  on  the  raw  hides  in  the  cart  lay  a 

309 


3IO  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

tiny  sack  of  mail  and  beside  it  the  tawny  mot- 
tlings  of  a  fresh  stripped  jaguar  skin.  The  cart 
stopped  before  the  cane  house  of  the  intendente 
and  that  functionary  rolled  lazily  from  his  ham- 
mock and  signed  a  paper;  the  half-breed  roused 
himself  from  the  corrugated  floor  of  split  palm 
logs,  and  disappeared  in  the  jungle  paths  of  the 
scattered  settlement  to  gather  his  crew,  and  by 
that  I  knew  that  at  last  my  time  for  embarking 
on  the  muddy,  swirling  current  of  the  Rio  Beni 
had  arrived. 

Eight  hundred  miles  back,  through  canon  and 
mountain  torrent,  over  the  giant  passes  of  the 
inner  Andes,  lay  the  Bolivian  capital  of  La  Paz, 
the  last  civilization  from  the  Pacific  shore. 
Two  thousand  miles  to  the  eastward  from  this 
little  frontier  nucleus  of  Rurrenabaque  lay  the 
civilization  that  groped  its  way  westward  from 
the  Atlantic,  while  between  were  long  reaches 
of  desolate  rivers,  and  primitive  jungle. 

The  few  whites — refugee  mostly ;  two,  I  knew, 
had  a  price  on  their  heads  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Andes — popped  out  of  their  cane  shacks  to 
see  me  off.  Even  in  these  remote  parts,  where 
distance  is  counted  in  so  many  days'  travel,  the 
long  river-trail  to  the  Atlantic  is  reckoned  out 


OFF  ACROSS   THE    CONTINENT    311 

of  the  ordinary.  My  big  canoe  would  take  me 
only  to  the  Falls  of  the  Madeira,  and  yet  it 
would  be  three  months  before  the  crew  would 
return  to  Rurrenabaque  on  their  slow  trip 
against  the  current. 

My  Rurrenabaque  host,  a  dried-up  little  Eng- 
lishman who  had  packed  alone  on  foot  over  the 
high  passes  to  this  interior,  and  whose  reckless 
nerve  will  pass  into  ultimate  legend,  flapped 
about  in  half-slippered  feet  as  he  supervised  the 
loading  of  my  baggage  on  the  batalon  that  was 
sluggishly  swinging  to  its  vine  moorings  in  the 
current.  His  Cholo  wife  with  her  flaring  skirts, 
high-heeled,  fancy  shoes,  and  pink  stockings, 
fluttered  amiably  about,  while  a  green  macaw 
and  its  inseparable  companion,  a  big,  gaudy 
blue-and-yellow  macaw,  crawled  affectionately 
over  her  shoulders.  Such  idle  Tacanas,  Mojos, 
or  Leccos  who  incautiously  and  curiously  ap- 
proached were  pounced  upon  by  my  host,  whose 
reckless  Spanish  was  somehow  intelligible  and 
efficacious.  He  impressed  a  little  Tacana  man 
to  carry  my  cartridge-belt. 

"  Wot  ho,  chico,  'ere  you  are,  grab  'old!  Wot 
ho,  sokker  el  rifle  y  los  balas,  'urry  hup — pronto, 
de  prisa,  vamonos!  "    And  the  naked  little  Ta- 


312  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

cana  baby — for  he  was  scarcely  more  than  that — 
trotted  proudly  along  under  the  little  load. 
"  Abaht  t'  leave  us,  wot  ho,  yus  I  Goin'  'ome — 
I'm  goin'  'ome  myself,  next  year." 

Next  year!  Wherever  you  go,  however  far 
of5f  the  main  traveled  trails  you  may  drift  even 
into  those  unmapped  spaces  where  the  law  is 
carried  in  a  holster  and  buckled  on  the  hip,  you 
will  find  them,  American  or  English,  those  who 
are  scattered  on  the  fringe  of  the  world — and 
always  they  are  going  home,  and  always  next 
year!  Home!  Their  home  is  where  they  are; 
their  lives,  their  affections,  and  the  loyal  little 
interests  that  interwine  and  make  the  home  are 
all  about  them.  And  they  realize  it  only 
vaguely,  when  they  have  finally  set  a  date  for  de- 
parture and  it  begins  to  loom  in  the  future  like 
approaching  disaster  in  the  multitude  of  little 
separations.*  Like  my  friend  they  may  be  cotn- 
padre — godfather — to  half  the  river;  little  dis- 
putes are  laid  away  unto  the  day  of  their  arrival, 
and  their  word  is  righteousness  to  the  simple 
Indian  mind;  in  the  land  where  there  is  no  law 
they  are  ready  in  emergencies  to  carry  justice  in 
the  breech  of  a  rifle ;  they  have  earned  the  trust 
of  the  weaker,  white  or  native,  and  stand  forth 


OFF  ACROSS   THE    CONTINENT    313 

in  the  full  cubits  of  their  real  stature — and  al- 
ways they  are  looking  forward  to  going  home, 
next  year!  Born  from  out  of  poverty  and  the 
slums,  with  a  pathetic  loyalty  they  dream  of  the 
land  in  which  they  have  neither  ties  nor  friends 
and  where  a  fetid  alley  in  some  sweated  city  is 
hallowed  in  their  vague  desire. 

Down  on  the  gravel  beach  the  Tacana  crew 
was  gathering.  Each  had  his  own  paddle,  a 
light,  short-handled  affair,  with  a  round  blade 
scarcely  larger  than  a  saucer  and  crudely  dec- 
orated with  native  forest  dyes.  The  paddle,  a 
plate,  a  spoon,  a  little  kettle,  a  short  machete, 
bow  and  arrows,  or  perhaps  a  gaily  painted 
trade-gun  and  a  red  flask  of  feeble  powder,  con- 
stituted his  entire  equipment  for  the  many  weeks 
on  the  river.  Indifferent  to  the  white-hot  gra- 
vel, they  pattered  in  bare  feet  and  tattered 
clothes — for  unlike  the  Lecco,  his  near  neighbor, 
the  Tacana  is  careless  in  his  dress — and  dumped 
a  bunch  of  fresh-cut,  green  platanos  in  the  bow. 
The  soldered  tins  of  rice,  strips  of  charqui,  and 
the  boxes  of  viscocha — a  double  baked  bread  as 
hard  as  cement  that  does  not  mould  in  the  tropic 
humidity,  had  already  been  stored.  Two  Ta^ 
cana  girls,  still  children  in  years,  but  brides  of 


SH 


ACROSS   THE  ANDES 


THE    TACANA     BRIDES     ADJUSTED    FOR    THEMSEI.VES     COMFORTABLE 
NICHES   IN  THE  CARGO. 

two  of  the  boys  of  the  crew,  waded  out  and 
climbed  aboard  the  canoe;  the  half-breed  threw 
aboard  the  little  sack  of  mail;  I  waded  out;  the 
vine  moorings  were  cast  off,  and  with  a  splashing 
of  paddles  and  the  last  clattering  farewells,  we 
swung  out  into  the  Beni's  muddy  current.  The 
lonely  little  group  of  aliens  on  the  beach  fired 
their  rifles  in  salute,  their  diminishing  figures 
quivered  and  blurred  in  the  heated  air  that 
boiled  up  from  the  hot  gravel  shore  as  I  emptied 
my  magazine  rifle  in  response,  and  then  they 


OFF  ACROSS   THE    CONTINENT    315 

turned  and  plodded  slowly  back  to  their  cane 
shacks. 

The  sun  blazed  down  on  the  open  canoe,  and 
on  each  side  the  heavy  jungle  dropped  to  the 
water's-edge  without  the  ripple  of  a  leaf,  and 
only  our  progress  fanned  the  air  with  a  thin,  hot 
zephyr.  The  Tacana  brides  adjusted  them- 
selves to  comfortable  niches  in  the  cargo,  and 
chattered  gaily  with  the  crew.  Once  in  a  while 
there  was  a  tortuous  passage  choked  with  snags 
that  required  careful  work  on  the  part  of  the 
helmsman  while  the  crew,  perched  on  the 
thwart  six  on  a  side,  hit  up  a  rapid  stroke  to  fifty- 
five  and  once  to  sixty.  The  half-breed  and  I 
swung  our  feet  over  the  tiny  deck  aft  and  broiled. 

The  b  a  t  a  1  o  n 
was  a  huge,  heavy 
canoe,  thirty  feet 
in  length,  with  a 
beam  of  about 
ten  feet  while  ^ 
the  bow  and  stern 
were  blunt,  giving 
the  canoe  the  ef- 
fect of  a  pointed  ^^"""^ 
scow.  At  the  stern  AT  the  tii,i,er  presided  a  huge  tacana. 


3i6  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

was  a  rudder  with  a  high  rudderpost,  and  at  the 
tiller  presided  a  huge  Tacana  upon  whose  face 
were  the  traces  of  the  painted  stains  from  some 
recent  celebration.  Every  stick  in  the  batalon 
was  heavy,  hand-sawed  mahogany.  The  cargo 
was  piled  high  amidships,  with  a  view  to  its  pos- 
sible use  as  a  breastwork  in  the  event  of  an  en- 
counter with  savages,  and  it  was  not  lashed  in 
place,  for  there  were  no  more  rapids,  and  the  ex- 
citement of  shooting  them  was  past. 

The  first  day  was  short,  for  to  make  an  actual 
start  was  most  important,  and  then  on  succeed- 
ing days  the  daily  work  from  dawn  to  sunset 
flowed  easily  along.  We  stopped  for  the  night 
at  Alta  Marani,  where  two  Englishmen  had  a 
little  headquarters  of  their  own.  They  had  a 
fleet  of  dugout  mahogany  canoes  with  which' 
they  shot  the  river  between  Mapiri  and  Rur- 
renabaque.  Four  canoes  were  lashed  side  by 
side,  the  cargo  was  bolted  under  the  decks,  so 
that  in  principle,  independently  invented  here 
and  by  them,  they  were  diminutive  whalebacks 
like  those  of  the  Great  Lakes,  and  the  gaskets 
and  cargo  tarpaulins  were  of  pure  rubber. 

The  years  of  frontier  life  had  browned  them 
like  Tacanas;  they  spoke  half  a  dozen  native 


OFF  ACROSS   THE    CONTINENT    317 

dialects ;  barefooted  and  half  naked,  they  could 
run  the  river  or  hunt  with  any  Indian,  and  their 
toughened  skins  were  indifferent  to  sand-fleas 
and  mosquitos.  One,  a  mighty  hunter,  painted 
his  face  in  ragged  streaks  after  the  manner  of 
the  Tacanas  when  on  the  hunt.  Wild  animals, 
he  claimed,  seemed  to  have  less  fear  of  him,  and 
in  some  way  he  believed  it  blended  the  man  with 
the  flickering  sunlight  of  the  forest.  It  may  be, 
for  I  have  seen  the  brilliantly  mottled  jaguar 
'skin  flung  on  the  ground  in  the  forest  become 
merged  to  practical  invisiblity  fifty  feet  away. 

Half  the  night  they  sat  naked  to  the  waist  in 
clouds  of  mosquitos  and  insects,  talking.  The 
single  tiny  candle  flickered  in  the  cane-walled 
darkness  of  their  shack;  the  glittering  eyes  of  the 
Mojo  and  Tacana  retainers  gathered  in  the  door- 
way to  listen  to  the  peculiar  noises  made  by  white 
men  in  conversation.  Here  and  there  on  the 
walls  was  some  splintered  arrow — the  idle  sou- 
venir of  some  little  fight,  a  tapir,  wallowed 
through  the  jungle  across  the  river;  and  the  oc- 
casional wail  of  a  wandering  jaguar  came  to  us 
as  we  talked  for  hours  of  Thackeray,  Stevenson, 
Dickens,  Scott,  Kipling,  and  "  Captain  Ket- 
tle!" 


3i8  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

The  last  was  first  in  adventure,  but  least  in 
charm.  "  That  fellow,"  they  said,  "  'e  certainly 
did  know  a  ship !  "  A  few  tattered  books  were 
there,  their  covers  long  since  gone,  for  they  had 
been  traded  about  over  hundreds  of  miles  of  this 
interior,  and  among  them  were  Laura  Jean  Lib- 
bey  and  Bertha  Clay.  Naively  they  asked  me 
about  the  latter.  "  They're  books  all  right — 
but  there  don't  seem  to  be  much  to  them."  And 
they  were  pleased  to  learn  that  their  prejudice 
was  rather  shared  by  the  academic  standards 
of  the  distant  outer  world. 

The  lives,  of  these  men,  as  they  looked  at  the 
matter  were  filled  with  trivial  routine;  romance, 
character,  adventure — were  the  things  bound  in 
books.  "  After  the  Ball  "  and  "  Daisy  Bell  "  still 
lingered  as  great  popular  triumphs  of  ballad  and 
the  Indians  shuffled  and  grinned  as  these  cal- 
loused dities  quavered  through  the  darkness. 
If  I  would  stay,  I  was  promised  all  kinds  of 
hunting — jaguar,  tapir,  monkey,  wild  hog,  big 
snakes,  and,  as  an  additional  lure,  only  half  a 
day's  march  back  from  the  river  a  brush  with  the 
savages !  The  palm  roof  of  these  men  was  the 
last  that  I  was  to  sleep  under  for  many  days. 

Before  dawn  the  next  morning  the  little  camp- 


OFF  ACROSS   THE   CONTINENT    319 

fires  of  the  crew  sprang  up  along  the  bank;  the 
Tacanas  shivered  in  the  soft,  cool  morning  air  as 
though  it  were  a  biting  blast,  and  then,  with  the 
first  rays  of  the  rising  sun,  we  waded  aboard 
once  more  and  were  off.  Well  into  the  fore- 
noon the  Tacanas  suddenly  stopped  paddling. 
"  Capibarra,  patron! "  they  whispered  excitedly. 
On  the  bank,  not  forty  yards  away,  stood  the 
capibarra,  an  amphibious,  overgrown,  long-leg- 
ged guinea-pig  sort  of  creature,  which  blinked 
at  us  with  startled  eyes.  From  the  steady  plat- 
form of  the  drifting  canoe  I  fired,  and  missed. 


NEVER   WAS    SUCH    AN   EXHIBITION   IN   THE   HISTORY   OE   FIREARMS. 


320  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

The  second  shot  also  missed.  In  brief,  I  emp- 
tied the  magazine  while  the  capibarra  darted 
about  in  a  panic,  attempting  to  climb  the  steep 
bank.  The  bullets  spurted  dirt  above,  behind, 
below,  and  before  him. 

The  ninth  shot  at  last  laid  him  out  dead. 
Never  was  there  such  an  exhibition  in  the  his- 
tory of  firearms.  The  crew  in  the  meantime  had 
unlimbered  their  shotguns  and  arrows,  and  were 
also  pouring  in  a  heavy  fire,  and  with  equally  un- 
successful results;  it  sounded  like  a  fair-sized 
skirmish.  At  noon,  when  we  tied  up  to  the 
bank,  the  crew  quietly  departed  into  the  jungle 
for  game  while  I  was  busy;  they  would  take  no 
further  chances  with  the  larder  with  me  along. 

"  Why  did  you  not  tell  me?  "  I  spoke  sternly 
to  the  crew  chief,  but  he  only  shuffled  uneasily 
on  his  huge  bare  feet;  it  was  later  that  I  learned 
it  was  believed  that  my  eye-glasses  were  the  evil 
influence  that  made  my  rifle  useless. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

THROUGH   THE  RUBBER  COUNTRY 

AS  we  tied  up,  the  next  day,  I  saw  the  crew 
quietly  sneaking  their  bows  and  arrows 
and  feeble  shot-guns  out  of  the  batalon. 
I  stopped  them,  and,  buckling  on  my  cartridge- 
belt,  prepared  to  go  along.  We  all  went, 
though  it  was  a  very  hopeless  party  of  Tacanas ; 
but  my  luck  had  turned.  Not  a  hundred  yards 
from  the  bank  we  ran  into  a  troop  of  six  big, 
black  spider-monkeys,  and  I  got  the  entire  troop ; 
only  one  needed  a  second  shot.  It  was  pure 
luck,  for  shooting  these  monkeys  is  virtually 
wing-shooting  with  a  rifle.  They  dash  over 
their  arboreal  paths  faster  than  a  Tacana  can 
follow  them  on  the  ground,  and  one's  only 
chance  is  when  they  pause  to  swing  from  one 
branch  to  the  next.  Never  again  was  I  able  to 
approach  the  record  of  that  morning,  but  after 

that  the  Tacanas  always  left  their  own  weapons 

321 


322  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

in  the  batalon  when  we  hunted  for  the  larder. 

They  could  pick  up  game-signs  as  they  pad- 
dled, and  read  the  indications  of  animal  life 
as  though  it  were  writ  large  in  the  silent  forests. 
When  we  went  ashore,  they  would  string  out  in 
a  long,  silent  line  of  skirmishers,  and  presently 
there  would  come  the  grunting  coo  of  a  monkey, 
the  scream  of  a  parrot,  or  some  long-drawn 
animal-call.  The  big  Tacana  helmsman,  who 
kept  near  me,  would  say,  "  There  are  three 
spider-monkeys  over  there,  patron,"  or  perhaps 
a  red  roarer  monkey,  whose  bellowing  love-song 
at  sunrise  and  sunset  carries  through  the  still  air 
for  miles.  Always  it  was  as  the  Tacana  said. 
The  line  of  Tacanas  could  fairly  talk  with  one 
another  in  an  animal  language  that  did  not  alarm 
the  forest  and  would  deceive  any  but  a  Tacana 
ear. 

Sometimes  there  would  be  a  wild  hog,  some- 
times wild  turkey,  or  a  big,  black  bird  very  much 
larger  and  more  delicious  in  flavor;  but  it  was 
the  monkey  that  was  the  standard  diet  for  many 
days.  With  seventeen  able-bodied  appetites  in 
the  outfit,  the  hunt  was  a  necessity,  and  mon- 
key the  most  accessible  game.  If  there  ever 
seemed  to  be  a  trifle  too  much,  the  Tacana  crew 


THROUGH  RUBBER    COUNTRY      323 

would  rouse  themselves  during  the  night  and 
have  additional  feasts,  until  by  dawn  the  supply 
was  gone.  On  sand-bars  they  would  forage  for 
turtle-eggs,  and  every  day  they  usually  collected 


BUT  IT  WAS  MONKEY  THAT  FURNISHED  THEM  WITH  THE  GREATEST 
DEI.ICACY. 

a  bushel  or  two  of  these.  But  it  was  monkey 
that  furnished  them  with  the  greatest  delicacy 
and  the  keenest  pleasure  in  the  hunt. 

Though  monkey-shooting  was  necessary  and 
there  was  for  the  moment,  the  thrill  of  skilful 
shooting,  yet  the  element  of  pathos  dominated. 
A  clean  shot  stirs  no  thought,  but  to  wound  first, 
as  must  happen  in  many  cases,  gives  a  queer  little 


324  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

clutch  at  the  heartstrings  that  can  never  be 
shaken  off.  The  little  monkey,  the  frightened, 
hopeless  agony  of  death  stamped  on  its  tiny, 
grotesque  features,  dabbles  aimlessly  with  little 
twigs  and  leaves,  stuffing  them  at  the  wound; 
sometimes  it  feebly  tries  to  get  back  among  the 
branches  that  make  his  world,  and,  as  you  ap- 
proach, there  is  never  any  savage,  snarling  stand 
where  he  meets  extinction  with  the  cornered 
heroism  that  seems  for  the  moment  to  balance 
the  scene.  Instead,  he  pleads  with  failing  ges- 
tures of  forlorn  propitiation,  and  with  hoarse, 
cooing  little  noises,  for  the  respite  that  would  be 
far  less  merciful  than  the  coup  de  grace. 

Never  will  I  forget  one;  it  was  a  question  of 
seconds  only  and  as  he  lay  there  on  the  ground 
he  waved  the  little  hands  at  me  as  if  to  motion 
me  back,  he  turned  the  little  twisted  face  away 
with  an  appealing,  deprecating  coo  from  which, 
in  this  supreme  moment,  even  terror  was  sub- 
dued. I  have  watched  men  on  the  field  of  battle 
with  the  death  sickness  upon  them  and  where, 
even  under  these  surroundings,  while  a  spirit  is 
struggling  into  the  great  mystery  there  comes  the 
inevitable  awe  that  lingers  like  a  vision  in  the 
recollection. 


THROUGH  RUBBER   COUNTRY      325 

That  was  human.  Yet  even  here,  before  this 
sprawling,  almost  human  figure,  the  feeble  ges- 
ture, and  the  soft,  caressing  coo  of  final  request 
I  felt  an  emotion  rising  with  a  solemn  dignity; 
it  was  life  itself  that  was  passing  from  the  pa- 
thetic little  body.  I  held  back  the  Tacana  who 
rushed  up  and  the  picture  is  still  vivid  of  the 
flickering  sunlight  in  the  jungle  forest,  a  few 
fallen  leaves  flecked  with  a  mortal  red,  while  a 
full  grown  white  man  and  an  Indian  stood  back 
silently  in  response  to  the  fading  appeal  of  a 
little,  dying  monkey. 

For  the  daily  hunt  the  canoe  was  moored 
where  the  jungle  met  the  river,  but  every  even- 
ing at  early  sunset  the  camp  was  made  at  the 
edge  of  some  broad,  sandy  playa  as  far  from  the 
forest  as  possible.  Long  before  camping  the 
Tacanas  had  kept  a  shrewd  lookout  for  recent 
signs  of  savages,  and  after  chattering  among 
themselves  would  indicate  a  playa  that  seemed 
proper  and  secure.  The  savages,  primitive  and 
nomadic,  scarcely  more  than  animals,  offered  no 
menace  by  daylight,  but  in  the  darkness  lies  their 
opportunity.  With  instinctive  adroitness  they 
can  crawl  through  the  jungle  without  a  sound 
and  be  in  the  midst  of  a  camp  before  it  is  awak- 


326 


ACROSS   THE  'ANDES 


ened;  but  in  the  open  spaces  they  are  timid., 
They  will  line  up  fifty  yards  away  and  open  with 
an  ineffective  volley  of  screeches  and  arrows. 

Secure  in  this  custom,  the  Tacanas  set  no 
watch,  and  we  all  slept  peacefully  depending  on 
any  savages  that  might  come  to  furnish  the  alarm 
for  their  own  attack.  Though  signs  of  them 
were  all  about,  we  were  never  molested.     Often 


OFT^N  WE  PASSED  THE  LITTI^E  SHELTER  OF  PALM  LEAVES. 

we  passed  a  shelter  of  palm-leaves  by  the  shore 
that  had  been  used  by  some  party  that  had  come 
down  to  the  river  to  fish ;  for  only  in  the  interior 
and  on  the  smaller  and  absolutely  virgin  rivers 


THROUGH  RUBBER   COUNTRY      327 

and  tributaries  did  they  have  their  headquarters. 
Sometimes  there  would  be  a  tiny  dugout  against 
the  bank,  and  their  camp-fire  would  send  up  a 
thin,  blue  column  of  smoke  against  the  purple 
jungle  shadows.  The  Tacana  helmsman  would 
throw  the  canoe  beyond  arrow-range,  while  the 
crew  would  cease  paddling  and  call  "  Ai-i !  ai-i !  " 
across  the  river,  the  recognized  call  of  amity. 
Sometimes  there  would  be  the  glimpse  of  a 
timid,  naked  figure  darting  from  one  shadow  to 
the  next,  a  head  peeping  from  behind  a  tree, 
and  perhaps  a  wailing  "  Ai-i  I  ai-i  I  "  in  response, 
but  rarely  more. 

Once  we  came  upon  a  little  party  working 
their  way  in  a  dugout  against  the  current  under 
the  bank.  The  Tacanas  looked  to  their  arrows 
and  put  fresh  percussion-caps  on  their  shot-guns, 
but  the  instant  the  savages  spied  us  they  scuttled 
up  the  bank  and  remained  in  its  shadows  till  we 
drifted  past. 

Day  after  day  passed  in  the  slow  monotony 
of  routine.  The  low,  flat  country  never  varied; 
the  hot,  brazen  glare  of  the  Beni's  muddy  cur- 
rent rambled  in  a  twisted  aimless  course  ever 
to  the  eastward.  Always  at  the  dawn  the  vis- 
cocha,  or  hard  biscuit,  was  soaked  to  edibility 


3^8  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

in  hot  tea,  and  then  we  started  in  the  soft,  cool 
stirring  of  early  sunrise.  Slowly  the  cool  breeze 
disappeared,  the  chatter  of  the  parrots  died 
away,  the  water  fowl  aligned  themselves  in  mo- 
tionless, drying  groups,  incurious  and  fearless  as 
we  paddled  past  their  sand-bars  and,  like  the 
opening  door  of  a  furnace,  there  came  the  fierce 
heat  of  the  tropic  day.  The  muddy  river  gave 
no  hint  of  its  depth  or  channel,  and  sometimes 
the  canoe  would  run  aground  and  the  Tacanas 
would  tumble  overboard,  laughing  and  splash- 
ing, to  ease  her  off  and  then  line  out,  with  wide 
intervals,  as  skirmishers,  to  locate  a  channel  that 
would  pass  us  through  the  maze  of  submerged 
sand-bars.  Not  a  thought  was  given  to  the  alli- 
gators that  infested  the  river,  and  the  Tacana 
who  located  the  channel  would  swim  carelessly 
about  with  huge  enjoyment.  Again  would  come 
the  steady  splashing  of  paddles  and  the  double 
line  of  rhythmic,  swaying  Tacana  backs;  then 
at  noon  the  daily  hunt  and  the  drowsy  resting 
in  the  forest  shade  while  the  Tacana  girls  busied 
themselves  with  the  breakfast  where  a  pig,  a 
capibarra  or  a  row  of  monkeys  were  slowly  roast- 
ing on  the  hot  coals. 

Rapidly    the    afternoon    wears    away   until 


THROUGH  RUBBER    COUNTRY      329 

cooler,  more  mellow  glow  announces  the  ap- 
proaching sunset  and  then  the  chatter  among  the 
Tacanas  as  they  discuss  the  signs  for  the  night's 
camp.  The  little  tolditas,  the  mosquito  nettings, 
would  sway  from  their  poles  in  the  gentle  breeze, 
a  quick  supper  would  evolve  from  the  remains 
of  the  noon  breakfast  and  be  followed  by  the 
issue  of  the  cane-sugar  alcohol.  Sometimes  af- 
ter dark  the  Tacanas  would  paint  their  faces  in 
streaks  with  the  berries  foraged  at  noon,  and 
grimace  and  hop  about  the  glowing  embers  of 
the  fire  with  shrieks  of  joy.  Any  odd  grimace 
or  ridiculous  streaking  caused  a  riotous  outburst, 
for  their  minds  were  as  simple  as  infants'.  Once 
— and  it  gave  them  delirious  pleasure  for  a 
whole  night — they  set  fire  to  an  island  of  charo, 
the  cane  from  which  the  walls  of  their  shacks 
are  made,  and  all  through  the  darkness  it 
crackled  and  burst  in  little  explosions,  as  though 
a  nervous  picket-line  were  protecting  our  flank. 
Slowly  the  days  passed,  and  it  was  with  the 
most  cheerful  emotions  that  we  at  last  picked  up 
the  first  signs  of  the  frontier  toward  which  we 
were  working.  It  was  only  the  shack  of  a  lonely 
rubber-picker,  and  the  poorly  made  hut  was  bare 
to  the  verge  of  destitution.     Its  whole  outfit  was 


330  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 


y.^- 


IT  WAS  ONI,Y  THS  SHACK  OF  A  WNEIvY  RUBBER  PICKER. 

scarcely  more  than  that  of  one  of  the  Tacana 
crew;  there  was  a  cheap  shot-gun,  some  powder 
and  ball,  yet  the  bow  and  arrows  were  his  hunt- 
ing mainstay  to  save  the  expensive  use  of  the 
other.  Near  by  there  was  an  uncultivated  patch 
of  rice,  corn,  a  few  yuccas,  bananas,  and  some 
tobacco-plants.  Under  the  cane  bunk  was  a 
pair  of  primitive  rubber  shoes,  made  of  the  pure 
rubber  mixed  with  a  little  gunpowder,  and 
smoked  on  a  block  of  wood  roughly  hewn  to  the 
shape  of  a  foot.  I  often  saw  these  curious  rub- 
ber shoes,  which  apparently  can  serve  no  pur- 
pose with  their  callous-footed  wearers  except 


THROUGH  RUBBER   COUNTRY      331 

that  of  stylish  ornament.  In  one  corner  were  a 
few,  brown  bolachos  of  rubber,  which  would  be 
valued  at  twelve  or  fifteen  hundred  dollars  in  the 
market,  but  for  which  the  picker  would  receive 
from  his  patron  not  enough  to  free  him  from 
debt  for  his  past  and  future  supplies  meager  as 
they  are. 

As  we  tied  up  to  the  bank,  he  and  a  boy  helper 
had  just  gathered  the  rubber  sap  and  were  busy 
smoking  it.  A  huge  tin  basin,  a  giant  counter- 
part of  the  tin  basin  that  sits  on  the  wash  bench 
outside  every  American  farm-house,  was  half 
full  of  a  white  fluid  that  looked  for  all  the  world 
like  a  rather  chalky  milk;  before  it,  in  a  little 
pit,  was  a  tin  arrangement  something  like  a  milk 
can  with  an  open  top  out  of  which  poured  a  thin, 
blue,  hot  smoke ;  and  above  the  pit  was  a  frame 
on  which  rested  a  round  stick  that  held  a  globu- 
lar mass  of  yellowish  rubber  previously  smoked 
and  cured.  The  round  stick  was  rolled  over  the 
basin,  a  cupful  of  the  new  rubber  was  ladled 
over  the  mass  as  it  was  rolled  back  into  the 
smoke,  and  there  held  and  manipulated  until  the 
whole  surface  was  thoroughly  smoked.  In  the 
thin,  blue  smoke  it  at  once  turned  a  pale  yellow. 

Layer  by  layer  the  bolacho  is  built  up  with 


332 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


IN  THS  THIN  BlVt  SMOK^  IT  AT  ONCK  TURNED  A  PAI^E  Y^I.I,OW. 

each  day's  gathering  of  sap,  and  months  after, 
when  it  is  cut  open  and  graded,  the  history  may 
be  read  in  the  successive  layers;  this  day's  sap 
was  gathered  in  the  rain,  the  paler,  sourer  color 
showing  that  water  had  trickled  down  the  bark 
and  into  the  little  cups ;  the  dirt  and  tiny  chips 
show  that  this  day  was  windy;  and  there  in  the 
darker  oxidization  of  the  layer,  is  revealed  the 
fact  of  a  Sunday,  a  fiesta  or  drunken  rest  before 
the  succeeding  layer  was  added. 

Sometimes  as  the  batalon  of  the  patron  makes 
its  regular  trip  for  collection,  nothing  will  be 


THROUGH  RUBBER   COUNTRY      333 

found  but  a  gummy  residue  of  burned  rubber, 
a  rectangle  of  black  ashes  where  the  hut  had 
been,  and  near  by  broken  and  mutilated  remains 
of  the  picker;  for  the  feeble  trade-gun  is  only 
one  degree  better  than  the  enemies  with  which 
the  rubber-picker  has  to  contend.  In  such  an 
event  the  patron  curses  the  savages  and,  when 
these  losses  become  too  frequent,  may  return  on 
a  punitive  expedition ;  for  labor  is  scarce  in  these 
remote  districts,  and  the  loss  is  economic,  not 
sentimental. 


JUSTICE   IS   ADMINISTERED   ACCORDING   TO   TH^   STANDARDS   OP   HIS 
SUBMISSIVE  DOMAIN. 


334  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Farther  down  the  river  is  the  barraca  of  the 
patron,  a  large  clearing  in  the  forest  back  from 
the  bank  of  the  river.  Here  survives  feudalism, 
and  justice  is  administered  according  to  the 
rough  standards  of  his  submissive  domain. 
Somewhere  you  will  find  the  stocks,  with  the 
rows  of  leg-holes  meeting  in  a  pair  of  great 
mahogany  beams.  A  pile  of  chain-and-bar 
leg-irons  lie  in  a  near-by  corner,  and  a  twisted 
bull-hide  whip  hanging  from  the  thatch  above. 
In  an  open,  unguarded  shed  beyond  was  piled 
thirty  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  rubber, — it  is 
only  a  fraction  of  the  crop, — awaiting  shipment, 
and  in  the  early  moonlight  we  sat  with  the  pat- 
ron himself,  a  bare-footed,  cotton-dressed  over- 
lord who  was  scarcely  distinguishable  from  his 
own  debt-slaves.  And  he,  in  his  turn,  was  in  al- 
most hopeless  debt  to  the  commission-houses, 
who  hold  him  by  their  yearly  advances  in  trade. 

Rarely  now  did  the  tolditas  swing  from  their 
poles  in  a  night  camp  on  a  play  a;  on  down  the 
river  it  became  a  series  of  visits — sometimes  the 
daily  voyage  was  longer  in  the  darkness — but 
vigilance  was  now  no  longer  needed  in  choosing 
a  camp,  and  every  night  the  Tacanas  carried  our 
outfit  up  the  bank,  where  we  slept  serenely  in  a 


THROUGH  RUBBER   COUNTRY      335 

rubber-shed.  Coffee  reappeared,  and  the  In- 
dian wife  of  the  picker  or  patron  served  it  at  once 
on  our  arrival,  and  then  rolled  cigarettes  from 
home-grown  tobacco.  Rubber  was  the  talk — 
rubber  and  savages.  There  was  no  outside 
world,  and  I  was  a  curiosity.  The  Brazilian 
boundary  was  yet  a  month's  journey  with  the 
current  to  the  east,  and  Rurrenabaque,  against 
the  stream,  was  six  weeks  of  hard  travel  to  the 
westward.  To  them  La  Paz  was  a  vague  name, 
the  metropolis  of  the  world,  perhaps,  if  their 
primitive  existence  has  ever  stirred  to  the  idea 
of  a  metropolis. 

Rubber  and  savages  made  their  universe  1 
Were  the  savages  bad  coming  down?  Well — 
they  are  bad  this  year  down  the  river  farther — 
a  picker  was  killed  last  week  only  a  half  day's 
march  from  the  river.  One  of  his  men  shot  an- 
other the  other  day  among  the  cattle,  but  two 
more  got  away!  What  will  be  the  price  of  rub- 
ber? The  last  known  price  is  already  three 
months  old  in  the  quotations  in  Manaos. 
Money,  real  money,  it  was  useless.  Never  had 
a  gold  coin  looked  so  feeble  and  futile  as  on  this 
river,  where  merchandise  w^as  needed.  I 
bought  a  big  rubber  sheet  and  a  rubber  bag, 


336  ACROSS  THE   ANDES 

and  I  paid  a  box  of  cartridges,  a  package  of  pen- 
cils, and  a  fountain-pen  such  as  are  peddled  on 
the  streets  of  New  York;  I  was  supposed  to  have 
the  worst  of  the  bargain! 


CHAPTER  XXV 

A  NEW  CREW  AND  ANOTHER  BATALON 

ONE  night  we  made  no  camp  at  sunset,  but 
steadily  paddled  in  the  darkness ;  for  the 
journey  was  nearly  over  for  the  Tacanas, 
and  their  paddles  dipped  in  happy,  eager 
rhythm.  Then  the  canoe  was  beached  under 
what,  in  the  dim  starlight,  appeared  to  be  a 
cliff;  the  crew  carried  the  cargo  up  the  high 
bank,  and  there,  in  scattered  groups  of  twink- 
ling lights,  spread  the  settlement  of  Riba  Alta. 
It  is  purely  a  trading-center  where  the  big  rub- 
ber houses  have  their  headquarters  in  widely 
scattered,  high-fenced  compounds.  There  was 
a  church  of  mud,  with  a  tiny  bell;  a  small  de- 
tail of  Bolivian  soldiers  and  their  officer,  who, 
wonderful  to  relate,  spoke  English;  there  were 
enormous  warehouses  stacked  with  goods  at 
startling  prices,  with  French,  German,  and  Eng- 

337 


338  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

lish  clerks  who  could  chatter  with  the  natives  in 
half  a  score  of  primitive  dialects,  and  then,  in  the 
cool  evenings,  sip  huge  gin  cocktails  from  high 
tumblers  and  indulge  in  local  slanders.  In  the 
room  of  each  was  a  huge  pile  of  accumulated 
newspapers  from  home  that  they  carefully  read, 
one  each  day,  following  the  successive  dates — 
and  the  latest  was  three  months  old!  It  was 
as  isolated  as  a  Hudson  Bay  post  of  a  century 
ago. 

I  presented  my  letters  and  had  a  room,  a 
hammock,  a  shower  bath,  and  filtered  water  to 
drink  in  place  of  the  coffee  colored  river,  and 
I  was  disappointed,  for  the  clear,  crystal  fluid 
was  insipid  and  tasteless  after  the  long  weeks  on 
the  Beni.  The  Tacanas  were  to  rest  there  a  few 
days  and  then  begin  their  long  slow  return  to 
Rurrenabaque  and,  during  that  time,  I  arranged 
for  the  last  stage  of  this  interior  journey  on  down 
over  the  Falls  of  the  Madeira  where  a  river 
steamer  was  to  be  met  and  the  actual  frontier 
had  its  beginning,  or  ending.  From  Riba  Alta 
the  Beni  becomes  the  Madeira  River,  by  the  ad- 
dition of  the  Madre  de  Dios,  the  Orton,  the 
Mamore  and  the  Abuna.  And  a  day's  journey 
beyond  Riba  Alta  are  the  first  of  the  Falls  of  the 


A  NEW   CREW  339 

Madeira.  There  are  fourteen  of  them  scattered 
along  the  river  for  two  or  three  hundred  miles, 
and  ordinarily  only  two  can  be  run,  the  others 
being  weary  portages,  and  fourteen  portages 
with  a  heavy  mahogany  canoe  is  no  light,  frivol- 
ous trip. 

The  last  canoe  that  had  come  up  over  the 
falls  reported  that  a  steamer  from  Manaos 
would  arrive  and  leave  the  village  of  San  An- 
tonio, at  the  foot  of  the  last  falls,  in  less  than  a 
fortnight,  and  every  effort  must  be  strained  in 
order  to  make  it.  If  I  missed  that,  there  would 
be  six  long  weeks  in  that  unkempt  Brazilian  vil- 
lage before  the  next  transport  from  civilization 
would  arrive.  A  railroad  has  now  been  built 
around  the  falls,  starting  from  near  San  Antonio, 
and  steamers  are  a  little  more  frequent.  Now 
that  road  is  completed  it  opens  up  one  of  the 
greatest  virgin  territories  of  rubber  in  the  world. 

A  German  rubber-trader  in  Riba  Alta  was 
fortunately  leaving  for  Europe,  and  we  were  to 
join  forces.  He  hunted  up  a  little  canoe,  about 
fifteen  feet  long,  but  with  a  disproportionately 
wide  beam  that  made  it  look  like  a  coracle.  It 
was  as  heavy  as  a  scow,  and  we  stowed  a  block 
and  tackle  to  drag  it  over  the  portages.    We 


340  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

needed  four  paddles  and  a  pilot,  for  speed  and 
safety  cannot  be  secured  without  a  pilot.  His 
wages  were  equal  to  those  of  our  whole  crew,  a 
bonus  of  the  cargo  space  for  the  return  trip,  a 
rifle,  and  cartridges  and  also  the  amount  of  al- 
cohol necessary  to  get  him  into  this  amiable 
frame  of  mind.  He  knew  the  cataracts  and 
their  condition  in  the  varying  stages  of  high  and 
low  water  like  a  book,  he  could  take  advantage 
of  the  speed  of  the  current  and  then  swing  into 
the  portage  at  the  last  moment;  he  shot  the  pos- 
sible passages  and  chose  the  right  bank  for  a  por- 
tage ;  to  miss  the  latter  and  then  work  slowly  up 
stream  far  enough  to  make  a  crossing  and  not 
get  caught  in  the  falls  is  slow  work;  while  an 
error  of  skill  in  choosing  the  cataract  that  may 
be  run  may  fairly  be  considered  as  fatal. 

The  crew  had  to  be  rationed  for  a  six  weeks' 
trip,  down  and  back,  while  the  persistent  rumors 
of  savages  made  a  rifle  and  cartridges  a  necessity 
for  their  return.  The  traders  in  the  settlement 
regarded  it  as  hazardous  for  us  to  attempt  the 
trip  over  the  falls  with  so  small  a  party,  but  my 
German  friend  felt  that  in  the  speed  with  which 
we  could  pass  each  cataract  with  a  light  boat 
there  was  security,  and  the  crew  were  indifferent, 


A  NEW   CREW  341 

or  confident  in  the  presence  of  white  patrons, 
and  so  we  started. 

In  Riba  Alta  there  were  two  young  savages 
that  had  been  captured  in  a  recent  raid  far  up 
one  of  the  tributary  rivers.  One  was  an  Araona 
and  the  other  was  a  Maropa.  Reared  in  the  dim 
twilight  of  the  jungles,  their  eyes  were  unaccus- 
tomed to  the  brilliant  tropic  light  of  the  open, 
and  since  their  capture  they  would  hide  in  the 
houses  by  day  and  venture  forth  only  in  the  even- 
ing. Their  skins  were  rough  and  calloused 
from  the  jungle  growths,  and  clothing  was  a  de- 
lightful novelty,  though  only  a  toy.  They 
would  array  themselves  in  any  garments  they 
could  for  short  play-spells,  and  then  discard 
them  and  step  blissfully  forth  in  their  comfort- 
able nothing. 

The  tribes  of  this  part  of  South  America  are 
among  the  most  primitive  in  the  world.  Though 
they  had  no  knotted  muscular  development,  each 
of  these  savage  children  already  possessed  the 
strength  of  a  man,  and  in  their  aimless  play 
could  shift  boulders  that  would  tax  the  strength 
of  a  Lecco  or  Tacana.  They  could  scale  any  one 
of  the  branchless  trees  in  the  compound  like  a 
monkey,    and  with    as    little   apparent   effort. 


342  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

Sometimes  when  they  were  not  watched  too 
closely,  they  would  use  bow  and  arrow  with 
native  skill;  like  a  flash  the  arrow  would  be 
loosed  and  a  lizard  would  be  split  as  it  ran,  or  a 
fleeing  chicken  skewered.  I  was  told  that  after 
a  savage  child  is  captured,  the  greatest  care  must 
at  first  be  used  in  feeding  it,  as  it  is  totally  un- 
accustomed to  salt,  and  even  the  slight  amount 
used  in  bread  has  a  poisonous  effect  upon  it. 
The  Maropa  had  ulcers  that  were  attributed  to 
this  fact.  The  food,  platanos,  is  rubbed  in  ashes 
to  slowly  accustom  them,  and  after  about  six 
months  there  is  no  further  difficulty. 

The  night  before  we  left  Riba  Alta  an  Indian 
was  brought  around  to  tell  me  an  experience. 
He  was  a  rubber  scout  who  hunted  up  possible 
new  areas  of  rubber  trees ;  he  corresponded  to  a 
"  timber  cruiser  "  in  our  own  Northwest.  Some- 
where, about  a  couple  of  hundred  miles  back  in 
the  interior  from  this  settlement,  he  had  come 
across  the  trail  of  an  animal  unfamiliar  to  him — 
and  from  his  savage  infancy  such  forest  lore  had 
been  his  sole  academic  curriculum ;  it  was  a  trail 
"  like  a  snake — but  not  a  snake."  It  was  ap- 
proximately three  feet  in  width  judged  by  his 
gesture  of  measurement,  and  there  were  feet 


A  NEW   CREW  343 

marks  on  either  side  of  the  trail  like  a  turtle's 
flippers — but  only  two.  He  had  not  followed 
it  for  he  was  afraid.  About  a  week  later  in  the 
shallow  lagoon  of  one  of  the  great  lakes  that  are 
known  to  exist  in  that  part,  although  no  white 
man  has  yet  penetrated  to  them,  he  saw  a  long 
neck  raise  itself  out  of  the  water — a  long  neckl 
And  it  had  a  head  on  it.  A  snake's  neck,  he  was 
asked.  No,  he  insisted  it  was  not  a  snake,  he 
knew  snakes,  it  was  a  neck  with  a  head  on  it, 
something  new.  Then  he  fired  at  it,  and  it  dis- 
appeared— and  that  was  all. 

He  had  described,  in  the  combined  circum- 
stances, a  possible  plesiosaur.  What  he  saw  I  do 
not  know,  but  when  an  Indian  wants  to  romance, 
his  animals  have  the  regulation  iridescent  eyes 
and  spout  flames.  No  combination  of  two  over- 
lapping trails  could  deceive  him,  he  was  adept 
on  animal  trails,  nor  would  such  a  common 
place  incident  as  an  overlapped  trail  stir  his 
imagination.  He  had  never  seen  a  circus  poster, 
or  an  illustrated  treatise  on  paleontology,  but  he 
indicated  the  existence  of  some  animal  closer,  at 
least,  to  the  plesiosaur  than  any  known  and  dis- 
tant descendant. 

The  crew  had  been  gathered  that  same  night 


344  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

and  slept  on  the  beach  beside  the  monteria  so 
that  we  were  able  to  start  with  the  dawn.  Our 
first  day  was  unlucky.  The  heavy  canoe,  with 
scarce  eight  inches  of  freeboard,  was  swept  on  a 
snag  that  started  one  of  the  planks.  The  inner 
bark  of  a  tree  that  is  used  for  calking,  and  which 
is  always  carried  for  such  emergencies,  could 
not  keep  the  water  down,  and  we  were  forced  to 
beach  the  canoe  for  repairs.  This  delay,  with 
the  constant  vision  of  a  lost  steamer  below  the 
falls,  kept  the  German  and  myself  toiling  in  the 
blazing  sun  by  the  side  of  the  crew  emptying 
cargo,  patching  and  then  reloading.  The  canoe 
still  made  water,  but  we  hoped  farther  down  the 
river  to  exchange  it.  That  night  we  had  to 
camp  on  a  sand-bar,  and  it  was  not  until  the  next 
day  that  we  made  the  first  of  the  falls, — or 
cachuelasj  the  Falls  of  Esperanza. 

At  this  cataract  is  the  headquarters  of  the  larg- 
est single  rubber  in  South  America.  His  bata- 
lones  and  even  tiny  river  steamers  ply  from  Es- 
peranza throughout  the  enormous  watershed 
gathering  the  rubber  and  sending  it  out  over  the 
falls  in  large  expeditions.  Here  he  has  little 
machine  shops,  a  fair  sized  village  of  employees 
all  under  his  control,while  off  in  one  corner  by 


A  NEW   CREW  345 

the  edge  of  the  jungle  is  a  marble  shaft  sur- 
rounded by  a  little  rusted  iron  railing  that  he 
has  erected  to  the  memory  of  his  wife.  The 
shaft  and  its  pedestal  have  been  slowly  dragged 
around  the  portages  in  a  labor  that  lasted  months, 
and,  as  it  stands,  the  tender  tribute  represents 
somewhere  near  its  weight  in  silver  bullion.  A 
little  tramway  of  his  runs  around  this  cataract 
and  by  its  use  we  saved  many  hours  of  portage ; 
even  the  monteria  was  hoisted  with  borrowed 
labor  on  the  tiny  car  and  hauled  around. 

At  this  Cachuela  Esperanza  I  observed  that  it 
was  not  a  falls  such  as  we  picture  in  connection 
with  the  word,  a  veritable  Niagara  or  Victoria 
where  the  water  drops  sheer  in  a  mass  of  foam- 
ing thunder;  it  is  a  gorge  or  a  series  of  little 
canons  channeled  through  mountains  of  buried 
rock  lying  at  right  angles  to  the  course  of  the 
river.  The  series  of  the  Falls  of  Madeira  seem 
to  be  all  of  this  character — parallel  mountain- 
chains  of  rock  at  irregular  distances  from  one 
another,  which  come  near  enough  to  the  surface 
to  act  as  dams  until  the  ages  of  insistent  current 
have  worn  their  narrow  channels.  In  high 
water  the  rock  is  often  entirely  covered,  and 
nothing  shows  but  the  shift  and  coil  of  great 


346  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

eddies  and  whirlpools  to  mark  the  choked  gorges 
beneath.  Each  main  cataract  is  guarded  by  a 
smaller  one  above  and  a  second  one  below,  often 
quite  as  dangerous,  and  making  an  average  of 
twenty  portages  necessary. 

In  three  days  we  reached  Villa  Bella,  a  tiny 
settlement  on  the  peninsula  formed  by  the  Ma- 
more  River  joining  the  Madeira.  In  this  little 
wilderness  town,  a  sort  of  half-way  between  Riba 
Alta  and  San  Antonia,  the  few  streets  were  al- 
ready laid  out  with  rectangular  primness,  each 
house  was  compelled  to  keep  a  light  burning 
outside  until  the  late  hour  of  9  P.  M^  and  there 
was  a  street-cleaning  department  of  one,  whose 
duty  included  keeping  the  weeds  out  of  the 
streets.     There  were  also  rudimentary  sidewalks. 

The  night  of  our  arrival  there  was  a  dance 
given  in  the  cane-walled  house  that  combined 
the  functions  of  club,  cafe,  billiard-room,  and 
hotel.  The  sole  music  was  by  an  accordion,  and 
stately,  shuffling,  swaying  dancers  simpered  and 
coquetted  and  performed  all  the  polite  maneu- 
vers to  its  jerky  rhythm,  while  the  dust  rose  from 
the  corrugated  floor  of  split  palm-logs,  and  the 
smoking  kerosene  lamps  and  tallow  candles  bat- 
tled and  triumphed  over  the  soft  evening  atmos- 


A  NEW   CREW  347 

phere.  Every  chink  and  crevice  and  window 
held  its  glittering,  enraptured  Indian  eye,  and 
even  the  elite  caught  their  breath  at  the  reckless 
pop  of  warm  imitation  champagne  at  ten  dollars 
a  bottle.  Truly  it  was  a  grand  affair.  Ice  for 
the  champagne  had  been  hoped  for,  and  the  gen- 
tleman who  owned  an  ice-machine,  as  he  fondly 
believed,  showed  it  to  me  and  asked  my  assist- 
ance in  operating  it.  Naively  he  had  bought  an 
ice-cream  freezer,  but  so  far  it  had  proved  ob- 
durate to  his  labor,  and  had  brought  forth  no 
ice. 

We  exchanged  our  leaking  canoe  for  a  sound 
one,  a  trifle  larger,  and  pushed  on.  A  few  hours 
below  over  the  Falls  of  the  Madeira  proper — 
a  minor  one  of  the  series  guarding  the  little 
rapids  at  the  head  we  ran,  while  a  short  portage 
brought  us  into  the  clear  river  again.  Three 
batalones  were  running  their  cargo  of  rubber 
through  the  gorges  at  the  side  of  the  cataract. 
The  bolachas  of  rubber  were  threaded  on  long 
ropes,  like  a  string  of  beads;  one  of  the  crew 
would  take  the  end  of  the  rope  in  his  teeth,  and, 
swimming  or  wading,  guide  it  through  the  ed- 
dies near  shore.  Often  he  would  have  to  let  go, 
and  with  a  rush  it  would  be  sucked  into  the  cata- 


348 


ACROSS   THE   ANDES 


THE  BOLACHAS  OF  RUBBER  AR^  THREADED  ON  IX)NG  ROPES. 

ract  like  a  long,  knotted,  water-snake,  while 
others  of  the  crew  would  swim  out  and  recover 
it  below. 

At  this  cataract  the  lightened  batalones  them- 
selves could  be  run  through,  and  the  whole  of 
three  crews  would  be  concentrated  in  one  for  the 
passage.  Out  into  the  eddies  it  would  sweep 
with  thirty  paddles  straining  over  the  high  free- 
board, giving  it,  in  the  distance,  the  appearance 
of  some  huge  and  absurd  water-bug.  Six  weeks 
it  would  be  before  they  would  land  in  San  An- 
tonio, and  then  two,  perhaps  three  months  more 
with  their  cargo  of  merchandise  working  back 
against  the  river.     With  the  killing  work  in  the 


A  NEW   CREW  349 

blazing  sun,  swimming  or  portaging  from  the 
crack  of  dawn  until  dark,  and  a  palm  mat  thrown 
on  the  sand-bar  at  night,  it  is  small  wonder  that 
rarely  a  crew  comes  back  from  a  trip  with  its 
full  roster.  Even  their  rugged  animal  physique 
is  not  proof  against  the  continuous  exposure  and 
hardship.  In  addition,  there  are  the  savages. 
One  expedition  is  still  talked  of  where  out  of 
three  batalones  that  started  with  their  crews, 
only  three  men  returned. 


CHAPTER   XXVI 

THE  FALLS  OF  THE  MADEIRA  AND  HOME 

SLOWLY  cataract  after  cataract  was  passed 
Madeira,  Misericordia,  Riberon — with 
three  long  portages  that  consumed  a  day 
and  a  half — Araras,  Tres  Hermanos,  Per- 
donera,  Paredon,  Calderon  de  Infierno  (''  Ket- 
tle of  Hell  ") ,  which  was  a  series  of  cool,  shaded 
channels  among  a  multitude  of  islands,  and 
finally  resulted  in  but  a  single  portage  around  a 
tiny  cascade,  although  in  high  water  the  Cal- 
deron de  Infierno  lived  well  up  to  its  name; 
then  came  Geraos  and  Teotonio,  two  cataracts 
that  challenged  comparison  with  the  rapids  be- 
low Niagara,  though  shorter. 

Between  two  of  the  cataracts  from  up  a  little 
tributary  river  there  had  been  reports  of  newly 
discovered  rubber  forests;  the  frontier  had 
blazed  as  though  over  a  bonanza  gold  field ;  tre- 
mendous  tales   of   the   daily   pick   were   told, 

350 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  351 


DRAGGING  A  ""  BATALON  ''  AROUND  A  PORTAG^  OF  TH^  MADEIRA  FALLS. 

thirty,  forty  pounds  of  pure  rubber  a  day!  Ex- 
peditions outfitted  for  a  long  stay  were  follow- 
ing one  another  to  claim  territory  and  we  knew 
at  the  mouth  of  that  river  was  a  rough  head- 
quarters where  there  would  be  company  in  the 
night's  camp  and  the  pleasant  interchange  of 
rumor.  So  we  made  no  camp  at  sunset,  though 
the  crew  murmured.  It  was  pitch  black,  the 
overcast  sky  shrouded  even  the  faint  starlight. 
We  literally  felt  our  way  close  by  the  high 
bank,  while  the  paddles  slipped  through  the 
water  with  scarcely  an  audible  drip.  The  little 
animals  of  the  night  scuttled  on  the  bank,  and 
out  of  the  darkness  would  gleam  tiny,  scared 
eyes. 


352  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

Suddenly  from  near  the  bow  came  the  heavy 
lap  of  a  tongue  upon  the  current  not  a  paddle's 
length  away.  An  Indian  dashed  a  paddleful  of 
water  at  the  sound,  and  with  a  startled  crash 
against  the  brush  there  was  a  heavy  leap  to  the 
bank  above,  and  there  came  the  low,  rippling 
snarl  of  a  jaguar  and  the  sound  of  scattering 
leaves  as  its  angry  tail  whipped  the  under- 
growth. With  cocked  rifles  we  waited  for  the 
gleam  of  eyeballs — to  have  fired  without  that 
much  chance  would  have  made  the  spring  cer- 
tain— and  motionless  the  crew  let  the  canoe 
drift  past.     It  seemed  an  age! 

An  hour  more,  and  we  came  to  the  mouth 
of  the  little  tributary.  A  dozen  batalones  were 
moored  along  the  narrow  beach  vaguely  out- 
lined in  the  camp-fires  along  the  bank,  and  back 
of  them  were  the  rough  huts  that  a  Brazilian 
had  already  erected  at  this  point.  Here  and 
there  the  feasting  crews  were  gorging  them- 
selves on  monkey  and  half-burned  strips  of 
tapir,  while  a  tin  can  of  alcohol  and  a  gourd 
dipper  were  free  to  all.  A  short  distance  up 
the  river  the  savages  had  appeared  that  morn- 
ing, and  one  of  their  men  lay  dead  back  in  the 
jungle,  while  another  was  in  one  of  the  huts 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  353 

with  an  arrow-hole  through  his  breast.  In  the 
main  shack  a  few  rods  off  was  a  woman,  white, 
pure  Brazilian,  who  spoke  in  the  low,  soft 
modulations  of  a  far-off  civilization,  and  who, 
by  any  of  the  standards  of  all  the  ages,  was  a 
beauty.  She  wore  the  simple,  single  gown  of 
the  frontier,  with  an  undergarment;  her  black 
hair  was  coiled  in  a  flowing  mass  that  curved 
low  over  her  forehead,  and  over  one  ear  was  the 
brilliant  blossom  of  some  jungle-flower.  She 
was  playing  a  guitar,  swinging  with  white, 
slender  bare  feet  in  an  elaborate  hammock 
against  a  background  of  rubber-traders,  native 
adventurers,  and  half-breeds,  where  the  smok- 
ing candles  dimly  outlined  their  rifles  and 
belted  cartridges.  A  drunken,  half-savage 
woman,  her  maid  probably,  whined  a  maudlin, 
gibberish,  and  over  all  rose  the  pungent  smell 
of  rubber  from  the  bolachas  piled  in  the  farther 
shadows  of  the  hut.  It  was  like  the  touch  of 
fantastic  fiction. 

At  the  cataract  of  Geraos  a  Brazilian  rubber- 
trader  was  trying  to  portage  his  batalon  and 
cargo  with  a  half-mutinous,  lazy  crew  of  Brazil- 
ian negroes.  A  couple  of  the  crew  would  work 
shiftlessly  while  the  rest  dozed  in  the  shade ;  it 


3^4  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

was  the  last  hard  portage,  and  we  offered  the 
Brazilian  our  block  and  tackle  if  his  crew 
would  help  us. 

"  Look  at  them  I "  he  said  hopelessly.  "  Talk 
to  the  head-man.  If  they  will  do  it,  I  shall  be 
glad.  Two  days  have  they  loafed  like  this,  and 
it  will  be  two  days  more."  He  swore  fluently 
in  Portuguese.  "  If  I  beat  them  or  shoot  one, 
they  will  have  me  put  in  jail  in  San  Antonio.  I 
am  losing  money,  but  it  is  better  than  jail." 
Obviously  we  were  nearing  civilization;  up- 
river  no  lazy  mutiny  was  possible. 

The  head-man  refused  surlily  unless  we 
would  stop  and  loan  them  our  crew. 

One  of  the  idling  crew — it  was  not  a  strike ; 
they  were  just  tired  and  wanted  rest — sauntered 
over  to  me.  He  was  a  powerful  negro,  with 
the  smooth,  supple  muscles  rippling  under  a 
skin  of  oiled  coal.  He  was  a  man  without  a 
language,  although  he  could  be  barely  intel- 
ligible in  three. 

"  Me  'Melican,  bahs,  tambien,"  He 
thumped  his  naked  bosom  like  a  war-drum,  but 
he  was  friendly;  to  his  mind  we  were  two  fel- 
low Americans  greeting  in  an  out-of-the-way 
place.     He  pointed  to  his  companion :  "  Him 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  355 

B'itish,  ho,  yaas."  Then,  like  a  chieftain  cnant- 
ing,  he  recounted  their  voyage  on  the  river: 
"  Ribber  him  belly  bad.  Muchas  wark — belly 
ha'd.  Me  bahs  him  belly  ha'd;  go  far  topside 
ribber.  Me  seeck;  you  got  him  li'ly  rum,  can- 
assa?  Wanee  catchem  li'ly  d'ink."  And  his 
B'itish  confrere  added  also  a  pleading  for  a 
"  li'ly  d'ink." 

He  insisted  that  he  was  an  American,  al- 
though born  in  the  Guianas,  but  he  admired 
America  so  much  he.  had  adopted  it;  and  he 
would  translate  the  heated  gibberish  of  un- 
known patois  with  his  friends  as  his  noble  de- 
fence of  our  superior  America  and  wind  up 
with  a  plea  for  a  "li'ly  d'ink." 

At  this  same  cataract,  in  a  wretched  hut,  lived 
some  kind  of  a  broken  down,  human  derelict, 
blear  eyed  and  worthless  and  nondescript, 
whose  desolate  fortunes  were  shared  by  a  poor, 
wretched  Frenchwoman  and  their  unkempt, 
pitiful  children.  Between  them  they  stood  off 
the  savages  from  time  to  time  and  in  the  inter- 
vals squabbled  drunkenly  with  each  other.  Six 
weeks  before  a  battle  between  two  crews  at  this 
portage  had  been  fought  around  their  shack. 
One  of  the  crew  had  stolen  a  woman  belonging 


356  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

to  an  Indian  of  the  other  outfit  and  when  the 
trouble  died  down  twelve  men  had  been  shot, 
together  with  the  woman  who  was  the  cause  of 
the  friction.  A  new  crew  had  to  be  sent  down 
to  help  out  with  the  batalones. 

But  the  cataract  of  Geraos  is  one  of  the  finest 
of  the  whole  system.  The  buried  mountain 
system  of  rock  lies  open  to  the  sky;  it  has  been 
channeled  in  deep  canons,  above  which  the 
waves  are  lifted  in  angry  fangs.  Their  roar 
carries  through  the  jungle  on  each  side  like  the 
steady  thunder  of  a  storm ;  whole  trees  that  have 
lazily  swept  down-stream  are  caught  in  the 
clutch  of  the  great  canon,  and  are  tossed  high 
above  the  canon  walls  as  though  they  were  only 
straws  caught  in  a  thresher. 

At  the  Falls  of  Teotonio  we  paddled  up  to 
the  very  brink  of  the  cataract  and  beached 
snugly  in  a  little  eddy  at  the  side.  Here  a 
broken-down  contractor's  railway  made  the 
portage  an  easy  matter,  even  though  it  was  done 
in  one  of  the  hardest  tropical  rainstorms  that  I 
have  ever  seen.  The  lightning  and  the  thunder 
were  continuous,  and  the  rain  drove  in  a  steady, 
blinding  sheet,  like  the  deluge  from  a  titanic 
nozzle. 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  357 

The  little  news  that  came  up  from  San  An- 
tonio drove  us  to  greater  haste  to  catch  the 
steamer;  the  steamer  was  there,  stuck  on  a  mud- 
bank;  it  had  gone;  it  was  coming.  Every  un- 
certain rumor  added  to  our  haste  and  desire. 
We  had  not  stopped  to  hunt,  and  supplies  were 
running  low.  Coffee  was  gone,  the  viscocha 
can  almost  empty,  platanos  and  charqui  were 
running  low  and  it  was  necessary  to  keep  the 
crew  well  fed  for  their  hard  and  steady  work. 
Twice  we  had  scared  a  capibarra  from  the 
bank,  each  time  beyond  possible  rifle  shot,  and 
now  we  were  looking  for  even  a  cayman,  for  a 
big  meal  of  baked  alligator  tail  would  go  a  long 
way  toward  helping  out  the  commissary. 

Knowing  our  need,  apparently,  the  game  was 
perverse  in  its  determination  to  annoy  us  by  its 
absence;  and  then  at  last,  on  a  playa,  far  down 
the  river,  the  crew  made  out  a  little  group  of 
three  capibarra.  It  was  the  only  time  I  ever 
knew  of  the  necessity  of  stalking  that  simple 
animal,  and  when  the  capibarra  fell,  kicking, 
and  the  others  darted  off  to  seek  the  bottom  of 
the  river,  the  problem  of  our  larder  was  solved. 

The  rapids  at  the  Falls  of  Macaos  we  ran  and 
then  below  there  remained  but  the  last.     We 


358  ACROSS   THE  ANDES 

had  expected  to  portage  about  the  Falls  of  San 
Antonio,  but  as  we  scanned  the  distance  below, 
there,  against  the  brilliant  green  of  the  forest, 
was  the  rusty  funnel  of  the  river  steamer,  with 
a  slender,  wispy  feather  of  steam  rising  beside 
It.  Steam  was  already  up,  and  how  much  time 
had  we  to  portage?  If  we  portaged,  it  might 
mean  six  long  weeks  of  dreary  waiting  in  a 
frontier  village  that  had  none  too  pleasant  a 
reputation.  Should  we  run  the  rapids?  The 
pilot  shook  his  head  doubtfully,  but  said  he 
would  try.  As  we  paddled  along  in  the  swifter 
current  it  did  not  look  bad — a  few  curling 
waves  crested  with  spray  and  then  long,  oily 
stretches  of  coiling,  boiling  water.  It  seemed 
possible,  and  it  was  worth  the  chance.  We 
would  try,  and  the  pilot  swung  the  canoe  for 
the  crested  wave  and  the  channel. 

We  threw  off  our  shoes,  unbuckled  our  belts, 
and  stripped,  to  be  ready  to  swim  in  an  emer- 
gency. We  emptied  our  rifles  and  revolvers  in 
a  fusillade,  hoping  to  attract  the  steamer's  atten- 
tion and  hold  it,  but  no  answering  whistle  came 
back.  An  instant  later  we  struck  the  long 
plunge  down  the  glassy  slope  of  water  at  the 
entrance  to  the  rapids,  and  a  foaming  cataract 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  359 

burst  over  the  bow,  drenching  us  with  spray. 
Then  came  the  slower  strain  and  wrestle  with 
boiling  waters  that  burst  upward  from  below, 
while  the  crew  paddled  like  mad,  with  the  pilot 
braced  in  his  cramped  quarters  aft  and  chatter- 
ing at  them  for  still  greater  effort.  The  boiling 
water  threw  us  broadside  on,  and  the  whirlpools 
caught  us  in  a  grip  that  the  frantic  paddling 
could  not  seem  to  break.  It  seemed  as  though 
we  were  standing  still  in  the  turmoil,  and  yet 
a  glance  at  the  rocky,  boulder-strewn  sides 
showed  that  they  were  shooting  past  like  a 
train. 

Broadside  on  we  darted  for  a  second  glassy 
slope  of  water,  and  only  in  the  last  moment  did 
the  canoe  swing  round  so  as  to  take  it  bow  on, 
while  the  wave  that  broke  over  us  half  filled 
the  canoe.  Had  we  been  heavily  loaded,  we 
would  have  had  our  swim.  It  was  the  last  of 
the  rapids,  and  a  second  later  we  drifted  out 
into  the  calm  current,  where  before  us  loomed 
the  high  decks  of  the  river  steamer.  We  could 
have  made  a  portage  without  risk,  and  with 
ample  time,  for  she  did  not  leave  until  the  next 
day. 

With  San  Antonio  village  fading  behind  us 


36o  ACROSS   THE   ANDES 

in  the  soft,  blue  distance  of  the  tropic  morning, 
civilization  began  slowly  to  reconstruct  itself, 
though  still  side  by  side  with  the  most  primitive. 
Brazilian  ladies  teetered  foolishly  over  the 
gangplank  that  was  run  out  to  the  mud-bank 
shore  with  their  high  heeled  shoes  radiant  with 
suggestion  of  the  highly  cultured  centers  of 
fashion ;  again  I  beheld  silks  and  fancy  parasols 
and  poudre  de  riz  and  heard  the  frou-frou  of 
real  garments,  immaculate  and  bristling  with 
frills.  Sallow  gentlemen  of  wealth  and 
haughtiness  came  aboard  with  their  retinue  of 
family  who,  in  turn,  had  their  retinue  of  half 
savage  servants,  to  escort  their  rubber  shipments 
and  sling  their  hammocks  from  the  stanchions 
of  the  cool  forward  deck  along  with  mine. 

All  day  we  broiled  sociably  together  and  in 
the  nights — when  we  anchored  in  the  river — 
slept  softly  in  the  balmy  night  airs.  Together 
we  listened  to  the  Madeira  pilots  swear  as  they 
ran  us  on  a  mud  bank  and  then  clattered  aft 
bossing  the  dumping  of  the  anchor  from  the 
steamer's  dinghy  in  order  to  warp  us  off  again. 
In  perfect  harmony  we  used  the  bathroom  to- 
gether and  splashed  in  the  overhead  shower 
early  in  the  morning,  for  later  the  sun  warmed 


FALLS  OF  MADEIRA  AND  HOME  361 

the  tank  above  to  a  stinging  heat,  and  threaded 
our  way  among  the  score  of  turtles  that  were 
herded  there  until  sacrificed  to  our  appetites. 
Closer  we  moved  to  the  equator  and  hotter 
blazed  the  sun.  And  then,  at  last,  early  in  the 
dawn  we  swung  steadily  out  of  the  great  mouth 
of  the  Madeira  River  and  into  the  greater 
waters  of  the  Amazon,  hugging  the  shore.  The 
little  river  steamer  breasted  the  current  up  to 
Manaos,  while  on  either  side  the  little  dugouts 
of  the  Indians  dotted  the  river  in  the  cool 
morning  shooting  turtles  with  a  bow  and  arrow 
for  the  market  at  Manaos.  And  then  in  that 
city,  still  almost  a  thousand  miles  from  the  At- 
lantic, there  was  civilization  at  last — trolleys, 
electric  lights,  little  cafes,  with  their  highly 
colored  syrups,  a  theater  and  gay  shops  with  all 
the  gimcrack  luxuries  and  necessities,  a  band 
and  the  shimmering,  swaying  endless  parade 
that  encircled  it  weaving  in  the  dense  black 
shadows  and  on  into  the  luminous  mosaics  cast 
by  the  arclights  in  the  leaves  overhead.  Dim, 
in  the  background,  the  chaperons  purred  to- 
gether but  with  an  unrelaxed  and  rigid  vigil- 
ance. It  was  civilization — all  but  the  vernac- 
ular. 


362  ACROSS  THE  ANDES 

La  Paz  seemed  half  the  world  away,  for  it 
had  been  three  months  and  twenty-one  days 
since  I  climbed  the  long  trail  to  the  high 
plateau  above  that  Bolivian  capital. 


THE  END 


^ 


RETURN     CIRCULATION  DEPARTMENT 
T0«-^      202  Main  Library 

LOAN  PERIOD  1 
HOME  USE 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

ALL  BOOKS  MAY  BE  RECALLED  AFTER  7  DAYS 

Renewals  and  Recharges  may  be  made  4  days  prior  to  the  due  date. 

Books  may  be  Renewed  by  calling     642-3405. 

DUE  AS  STAMPED  BELOW 

MAY  01 1992 

4 

AUTO  DISC. 

APR  0  6  1992 

CIRCULATION 

JUL  1 8  1993 

AUTO  DISC  CIRC 

JUM  18  '93 

:. 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  BERKELEY      [, 
FORM  NO,  DD6                                BERKELEY,  CA  94720 

l^?f  a 


i2.00  net 


VC   10458 


/ 


U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


CD3fi^5^fl3^ 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 


IvIBRARY 


•>»  . 


